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OF ENGLISH TEXTS 
GENERAL EDITOR 

HENRY VAN DYKE 



THE GATEWAY SERIES. 
HENRY VAN DYKE, General Editor. 

Shakespeare's Merchant of Venice. Professor Felix E. 

Schelling, University of Pennsylvania. 
Shakespeare's Julius C^sar. Dr. Hamilton W. Mabie, 

"The Outlook." 
Shakespeare's Macbeth. Professor T. M. Parrott, Prince- 
ton University, 
Milton's Minor Poems. Professor Mary A. Jordan, Smith 

College. 
Addison's Sir Roger de Coverley Papers. Professor 

C. T. Winchester, Wesleyan University. 
Goldsmith's Vicar of Wakefield. Professor James A. 

Tufts, Phillips Exeter Academy. 
Burke's Speech on Conciliation. Professor William 

MacDonald, Brown University. 
Coleridge's The Ancient Mariner. Professor George 

£. Woodberry, Columbia University. 
Scott's Ivanhoe. Professor Francis H. Stoddard, New 

York University. 
Scott's Lady of the Lake, Professor R. M. Alden, Leland 

Stanford Jr. University. 
iRViNG's Life of Goldsmith. Professor Martin Wright 

Sampson, Indiana University. 
Macaulay's Milton. Rev. E. L. Gulick, Lawrenceville 

School. 
Macaulay's Addison. Professor Charles F. McClumpha, 

University of Minnesota, 
Macaulay's Life of Johnson. Professor J. S. Clark, North- 
western University. 
Carlyle's Essay on Burns. Professor Edwin Mims, Trin- 
ity College, North Carolina. 
George Eliot's Silas Marner. Professor W. L, Cross, 

Yale University. 
Tennyson's Princess. Professor Katharine Lee Bates, 

Wellesley College. 
Tennyson's Gareth and Lynette, Lancelot and 

Elaine, and The Passing of Arthur. Henry van 

Dyke. 



(From a photograph from life by John Mayall, London.) 



GATEWAY SERIES 



TENNYSON'S 

IDYLLS OF THE KING 

GARETH AND LYNETTE 
LANCELOT AND ELAINE 
THE PASSING OF ARTHUR 

EDITED BY 

HENRY VAN DYKE 










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, . lb 



NEW YORK ■:■ CINCINNATI • :■ CHICAGO 

AMERICAN BOOK COMPANY 



LIBRARY of CONGRESS 
Two Copies Recdved 
JUL 8 1904 
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Copyright, 1904, by 
AMERICAN BOOK COMPANY. 

Entered at Stationers' Hall, London. 



IDYLLS OF THE KING. 
W. P. I 



# 



PREFACE 

This book is meant for readers who are at the gate- 
way of English Literature. I have tried to do my work 
as editor in a way which will not hide the poems, but 
help to show what they mean and why they are good 
to read. 

Poetry is made to give us joy, not pain. The true 
way to teach poetry is to keep the sense of it, and the 
beauty of it, and the music of it, in the foreground, and 
all the learned notes and curious comments in the back- 
ground. 

The two things most needed in our preparatory 
English work, just now, are simplicity and thorough- 
ness. Only enough of the life of Tennyson is told 
here to give a picture of the man, and to make clear 
how he came to write these poems. Only enough 
about the main plan of the Idylls of the King is said 
here to show the place of these three idylls in the epic. 
Only enough notes are added to explain difficulties and 
point out things that are interesting. If any of the 
notes seem to lead away from the poem instead of 
throwing light upon it, I advise the teacher to skip 
them. The text, speUing, and punctuation are those 
which Tennyson gave in his last revision of his work. 

HENRY VAN DYKE. 



CONTENTS 

Introduction : 

I. A Short Life of Tennyson 
II. The Story of King Arthur and His Knights 
III. Tennyson's Use of the Story . 
IV. The Meaning of the Idylls 
V. The Form of the Verse .... 



9 
i6 
20 

25 
36 



Idylls of the King: 

Gareth and Lynette ....... 41 

Lancelot and Elaine 97 

The Passing of Arthur 151 



Notes 



73 



INTRODUCTION 

I. A Short Life of Tennyson 

I. Alfred Tennyson was born on August 6, 1809 : the 
year that saw the birth of Gladstone, Darwin, and Lin- 
coln — four of the great men of the nineteenth century. 
There were twelve children in the family of the Rev. 
George Clayton Tennyson, rector of Somersby; and 
Alfred, the fourth, grew up in a happy English country 
home full of books and music and human interests. 
The children played fanciful games of tournaments and 
knightly wars ; they made up long stories of adventure, 
written in the form of letters and put under the dishes 
on the dinner table, to be read aloud when dinner was 
over. Sometimes, by the fireside on winter evenings, 
Alfred would gather the younger children about him and 
tell wonderful tales of dragons and witches and damsels 
in prison and heroes riding to rescue them. Sometimes 
an old play would be acted out by the family. 

The country about Somersby is quiet and friendly 
looking. There are no high hills, no great rivers or for- 
ests ; but there are beautiful gardens and fertile farms ; 
elms and poplars and ash trees around the houses ; 
brooks winding through the fields ; flocks of sheep feed- 

9 



lO Introduction 

ing on the long, bare ridges of pasture land ; birds a 
plenty; flowers growing everywhere. All this country 
the boy Tennyson knew and loved, and the man has 
told about it in his poetry. In the summer time he used 
to go down with the family for a vacation in a little cot- 
tage by the sea, not far away, on the coast of Lincoln- 
shire. He would lie on the sand hills watching the waves 
for hours, and at night he liked to walk by the sea and 
listen to its roaring. " Somehow," said he, " water is the 
element I love best of all the four." You will find many 
beautiful lines which tell about the look and the sound 
of water in the Idylls. 

When he was seven, Alfred was sent to the grammar 
school at Louth, a near-by town, where his grandmother 
Uved. But the school was a poor one ; the boy hated 
it, and soon came home again to study with his father, 
who was an excellent scholar. He began to write verses 
when he was about eight, being encouraged by his older 
brother Charles, who was a great rhymster. Alfred imi- 
tated the poetry which he hked best : Thomson's The 
Seasons^ and Pope's translation of The Iliad, and Scott's 
The Lady of the Lake. Then Byron became his idol, 
and he tried to write in the style of the Hebrew Melodies. 
When he was seventeen, he and his brother Charles brought 
out a little book called Poems by Two B7'olhers, with a 
Latin motto which said, " We know that these pieces do 
not amount to anything." This judgement was about 
right ; for though Alfred Tennyson was born a poet, he 
had not yet thought and felt enough to be able to write 



Introduction 1 1 

real poetry of his own ; he was only learning how to do 
his work, and learning by the best of all methods — imi- 
tation. 

Though he was very fond of books and regarded by 
his family as a genius, he does not seem to have been at 
all priggish or inclined to become a mere bookworm. 
He was tall and strong, fond of fun and out-of-door Hfe, 
clever with his hands, and a great walker. 

2. In 1828 he entered Trinity College, Cambridge, 
where he made many close friends among the best stu- 
dents in the university, among whom he soon became a 
leader in a way. He did well in his regular studies, except 
mathematics ; but it was as a reader, as a talker, as a 
debater in the little circle of friends called " The Apos- 
tles," that he made his mark. He won the chancellor's 
gold medal for a poem called Timbuctoo, He began to 
work out a line of his own in poetry, — a line that showed 
a deep and strong sense of beauty, a keen pleasure in the 
free play of fancy and the weaving of new and musical 
metres, a fresh and original choice of subjects, a sure and 
delicate touch in describing nature. He went back to 
the lyrics of the Age of Elizabeth and to Milton's early 
poems for inspiration. He worked in the same spirit 
which had made the poems of Keats, when they first 
appeared, seem to some people so fanciful and trifling, 
and to others so vivid and charming. It was the love of 
pure beauty for its own sake : the delight in the colour 
of a flower, the flow of a stream, the song of a bird : the 
desire for pictures of loveliness and words of melody. 



12 Introduction 

This is what has been called the aesthetic spirit. You 
can see its influence in Tennyson's two Httle volumes, 
Poems, Chiefly Lyrical^ published in 1830, while he was 
still in college, and Poems, published in 1832, soon after 
he had left Cambridge. It stayed with him all through 
his hfe, and enabled him to write some of the most beau- 
tiful lyrics in the world, like The Bugle Song and The 
Throstle and parts of Maud. 

But at first, people did not think much of the poems 
which Tennyson wrote in the sesthetic manner. It was 
too new and strange. His friends liked them. But the 
world at large did not care for them, and the critics were 
inclined to make fun of Mariana, and The Miller's 
Daughter, and The Palace of Art, and A Dream of Fair 
Wo7nen. Tennyson had been obliged, by his father's 
death, to leave college in 1831, and was living at home, 
very much cast down, and almost ready to give up poetry, 
since the world did not seem to want the kind of verse 
that he wished to write. 

3. Then came an event which had the deepest effect 
upon his life. His dearest friend, Arthur Henry Hallam, 
died suddenly in Vienna. Tennyson felt this sorrow in- 
tensely. It seemed to break up the dreaminess of his 
youth and thrust him into the real world. Human joy 
and sorrow came closer to him, meant more to him. He 
had a hard fight to keep his own faith in God and immor- 
tality. The story of this inward struggle is told in /;/ 
Memoriam, an elegy for his friend, which was begun in 
1833, but not finished until 1850. 



Introduction 13 

Meantime Tennyson published no book for ten years. 
He was studying, writing, working all the time to deepen 
and enlarge his poetry. In 1842 two volumes oi Poems 
were published, containing the best of his earlier pieces, 
much corrected and improved, and a number of new 
poems, among them some of the finest that he ever wrote. 
Almost at once he became a popular poet, and from this 
time on his fame and influence steadily grew. 

If you will look into these two volumes of 1842 you will 
see why this happened. A soul had come into his poetry. 
Beauty of form, though it was still there, was no longer 
the chief thing ; beauty of meaning, and depth of feehng, 
and power to touch the real secrets of life, were more 
important. There were ballads, like Locksley Hall, and 
Lady Clara Vere de Vere, and the conclusion of The May 
Queen, which came very close to the heart of man. 
There were poems in blank verse, Kke Ulysses, and Do7'a, 
and Morte d' Ai'thur, in which noble thoughts and feelings 
were nobly spoken. 

This last poem has a special interest for us just now, 
because it was the beginning of that part of Tennyson's 
work which we are to study in this book. The Morte 
d' Arthur is the first form of that one of the Idylls of the 
King which is here given as The Passing of Arthur. It 
was written in 1834; and the introduction speaks of it, 
half playfully, as the eleventh of twelve books in an 
" epic of King Arthur " which the poet had made, but 
all of which, except this fragment, he had thrown into the 
fire. This is probably a poetic fiction. But it shows, at 



14 Introduction 

least, that the idea of an epic on the subject of Arthur 
and the Round Table had already entered the poet's 
mind. How long it was before he took the plan up 
again and worked it out, you shall see. 

4. In the interval a new element of strength was to 
come into the poet's life. Social and patriotic interests 
began to play a larger part in the growth of his mind and 
heart. His popularity brought him more into contact 
with public affairs. He began to think more of the 
questions that rise out of the common life of men. In 
1847 he published a long poem called The Princess, in 
which he dealt, half in earnest, half in jest, with the ques- 
tion of woman's place in the world and the right way to 
educate her for it. In 1850, after the publication of 
In Memoriam, he was made Poet Laureate ; an honorary 
office, attached to the Royal Household. In old times it 
carried with it the duty of writing odes in praise of the 
reigning sovereign ; but Queen Victoria in offering it to 
Tennyson said that this duty would not be exacted ; she 
only wished to keep up the ancient connexion between 
the Throne and the poets of the country, and to fill the 
office with one whose name would adorn it. It was 
natural, however, that people should look to the Laure- 
ate for some expression of their feelings of patriotism in 
connexion with public events; and Tennyson met this 
expectation with such poems as the Ode on the Death of 
the Duke of Wellington, The Charge of the Light Brigade, 
and the dedication of his collected poems. To the Qiieeji. 

In 1856, being then in his maturity as a man and a 



Introduction 



M 



writer, and having kept his first, aesthetic impulse, (the 
love of beauty,) in harmony with his second, religious and 
humane impulse, (the desire of truth,) and with his 
third, social and patriotic impulse, (the love of country,) 
Tennyson began to seek a subject for a long poem into 
which he might put the fullness of his powers. He re- 
turned to the old idea of an epic of King Arthur and the 
Round Table. In this cycle of legends he hoped to find 
a field for all the beauty of description and all the play of 
romantic fancy that he loved, and at the same time he 
meant to give them human meaning and interest by mak- 
ing them tell the story of man's real hfe and show the 
conflict between good and evil, which is the same in 
every age and land. The first parts of the story that 
he finished were Enid, Vivien, Elaine, and Guinevere, 
These were published in 1859. Then came The Comi?ig 
of ArtJmr, The Holy Grail, Pelleas and Ettarre, and The 
Passing of Arthur, in 1869. Gareth and Lynette and 
The Last Tournament were pubHshed in 1872, and in 
1885 Balin and Balan appeared. Shortly afterward the 
idyll of Geraint was divided into two books, and in 1889, 
for the first time, the title was printed Idylls of the King, 
in Twelve Books. Thus you see how long it took to 
bring the whole series of poems into their present shape, 
— from 1834 to 1889, more than fifty years. 

Now, before you go on to study the Idylls which are 
given in this book, a few words more must be written 
about the life of the poet. There was nothing in it that 
needs to be explained or defended. He lived peace- 



1 6 Introduction 

fully, honourably, happily, in his winter home at Farring- 
ford, in his summer home at Aldvvorth, taking care of 
his family, studying the great books that he loved, and 
especially the wonderful book of Nature, keeping up his 
friendships with good and wise men, and writing his 
poems. He traveled a good deal, through the pictur- 
esque parts of England and Wales and on the Continent. 
He was always observing, patiently and lovingly trying 
to see just how things look and to feel the meaning of 
them, so that his poetry might be true as well as beautiful. 
His powers did not seem to fail much as he grew old ; 
he was always a big, strong, true-hearted man, with a 
serious purpose and a warm interest in life. Some of 
his later poems, like Rizpah, The Revenge, and hi the 
Childf-eii's Hospital, and one of the latest of all. Crossing 
the Ba?', are among his best. In 1883 ^^ ^^^^ made a 
peer, with the title " Baron of Aldworth and Farringford," 
as if to say that his nobility came from his hfe and his work. 
In 1892 he died peacefully at Aldworth, and was 
buried, amid the sorrow of the Enghsh-speaking world, 
in the Abbey Church of Westminster. 

II. The Story of King Arthur and his Knights 

Was King Arthur a real man? Did he ever lead the 
Britons in their wars? Were the Knights gathered 
around him in a band called the Round Table, or was 
the whole story a fairy tale made up by poets and ro- 
mancers of the Middle Ages ? 



Introduction 17 

A great deal has been said on both sides of the ques- 
tion : but the men who have studied the old books most 
carefully tell us now that Arthur was probably a real 
person, a leader of the Celtic chiefs and tribes of Britain, 
who were Christians, against the Saxon invaders, who 
were heathen. This was in the sixth century, and Nennius 
the historian, writing two hundred and fifty years after- 
ward, says that the Christian host overcame the pagan 
hordes in twelve great battles, in one of which nine hun- 
dred and sixty men fell by one onslaught of Arthur. 

But in the long run, as v^^e know, the Saxons conquered 
the Britons, and this real Arthur became the crowned 
hero of a vanquished race. All their poetry and legend- 
ary lore, keeping itself alive among the mountains of 
Wales and on the seacoast of Brittany, across the Eng- 
lish Channel, where the same race had setded, began to 
centre around the name of the great king. He had 
fallen to defend their hberty and their faith; but the 
legends said that he was surely coming back again to 
reign over them, according to the inscription on his 
tomb : Hie jacet Arthurus, i-ex quondam, rexque fiitiirus. 
Some of these poems and tales were probably written 
down, but for the most part they were spread by wan- 
dering bards and minstrels, who went about from place 
to place singing and telling stories. 

When the Normans conquered England the Celtic 
spirit seems to have been much aroused. In the twelfth 
century we find an English writer speaking of " the frivo- 
lous tales in which the Britons rave about Arthur." A 

IDYLLS OF THE KING — 2 



1 8 Introduction 

few years later Walter of Oxford, going over to Brittany, 
brings back a certain " very old book in the British lan- 
guage," and Geoffrey of Monmouth uses it to help him in 
writing a Latin History of the Kings of Britain. At least 
this is the story which Geoffrey tells about the way in 
which he got the material for his book. One thing is 
certain : a great deal of it must have come from Brit- 
tany ; and here for the first time we have the outline of 
the tale of King Arthur as it has become familiar to us, 
— the fountain-head of a stream of poetry. 

Now, in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, other 
men began to take up the tale and to add to it. The age 
of chivalry had come ; people delighted in ballads, and 
legends in verse, and prose romances. Walter Wace 
wrote about Arthur in French, and brought in the story 
of the Round Table. Layamon translated the tale into 
Enghsh in a poem called the Brut. The stories of other 
knights and heroes were woven into the theme, or spun 
out as separate tales. Chrestien de Troyes told the leg- 
end of Lancelot; Wolfram von Eschenbach, of Parzival 
and the Holy Grail. All over Europe, in courts and 
castles, these long adventurous tales of love and war, of 
single combats and enchantments and perilous quests, 
were read and recited, for two hundred years and more, 
while the Crusades were going on and the age of chivalry 
was in full bloom. Religious faith and romantic feeling 
were mixed up in them, in the most wonderful and pic- 
turesque way. 

Then, in the reign of Edward IV, about 1470, when 



Introduction 19 

the age of chivalry was beginning to wane, an Enghsh 
knight, Sir Thomas Malory, took up these old romances as 
he had read them in the French, changed them a little, 
and added to them, in order to make his story complete, 
and wove them together in a great prose fiction. This 
book was published by the famous English printer, Wil- 
liam Caxton, in 1485, at the close of the Wars of the 
Roses. It is called Le Morte Darthiir, and tells the full 
story of Arthur : how he became king of Britain and mar- 
ried Queen Guenevere ; how the Knights of the Round 
Table came to him, and of the many noble deeds that 
were done by them ; how he fought against the heathen 
and against Rome and made a mighty kingdom ; how 
Guenevere loved Sir Lancelot, and the shame that came 
of it ; how the king was overcome by treachery and mor- 
tally wounded, and carried away in a barge by three 
queens, and the Round Table broken forever ; yet there 
is no certainty of his death, but some men say that he 
shall return and win the holy cross. 

Now you see how long it took to make this story, and 
how much went into it ; first, a little bit of fact, the chief- 
tain Arthur, who led the Christian tribes of Britain against 
the pagan Saxons ; then, the memories and hopes of the 
conquered Celtic race in Wales and England, and their 
kinsmen across the sea in Brittany, making their hero into 
a king and putting their fancies and fairy-tales into his 
history ; then, the myths and legends of Christianity as 
it spread among the French and Germans and English ; 
then, the dreams and ideals of the age of chivalry, giving 



lo Introduction 

form to all that men thought brave and fine and true, in 
long tales of knightly adventure and love and fighting. 
All this grew into the Arthurian story between the eighth 
century, when Nennius wrote down the beginning of it, 
and the fifteenth century, when Sir Thomas Malory com- 
pleted the Morte Darthur. 



III. Tennyson's Use of the Story 

For a hundred and fifty years Malory's book was 
popular in England, and was printed again and again. 
Then it fell out of fashion and was read by few. Several 
English poets touched on the story, Spenser in The 
Faerie Queene, and Drayton in Polyolbion ; and at least 
two, Milton and Dryden, thought of writing an epic of 
King Arthur. But the only one who carried out such a 
plan was Sir Richard Blackmore, a rather stupid writer, 
whose long, dull poems, P^-mce Arthur and Ki7tg Arthur, 
are well forgotten. In the eighteenth century, a stiff and 
formal time, people despised the Arthurian story and 
made fun of it because it was so wild and romantic. But 
in the beginning of the nineteenth century romance 
came to life again, with Sir Walter Scott to make it 
popular. While Tennyson was a boy, Malory's book was 
reprinted, and people began to read it and admire it. 
Southey turned back to the old Welsh legends for the 
subject of a poem, and Wordsworth took a theme from 
Geoffrey of Monmouth. In France and Germany men 



Introduction 21 

were studying the romances of chivalry and writing about 
them. 

The Arthurian story attracted Tennyson, from the first, 
by its richness and beauty. He touched it hghtly in 
three lyrics : The Lady of Shalott (which is the story of 
Elaine in the form of a ballad), Sir Lancelot and Queen 
Guinevere, and Sir Galahad. Then he took it up more 
seriously in Morte d' Arthur (1834), but laid it aside 
again for twenty-two years. Meantime a book was pub- 
lished in 1837 which pleased him greatly, The Mahino- 
gion, a collection of old Welsh legends, translated by 
Lady Charlotte Guest. Tennyson traveled in Wales, 
and studied the language in order to be able to read 
a little in the original. In 1856, with Malory's book for 
his main guide, and with The Mabinogion and the Eng- 
lish and French romances for helpers, he set to work to 
make an English epic poem out of the story of Arthur 
and the Round Table. The poem, as you have seen, 
was written in separate parts, not coming out in a regular 
order of succession, but pubHshed at long intervals. The 
entire epic with its present title. Idylls of the King, i?z 
Twelve Books, stood complete in 1889. 

There were three things that drew Tennyson to this 
subject and made him choose it. First, there was an 
aesthetic impulse which made him wish to write about 
something beautiful and picturesque. Then, there was 
a religious impulse which made him feel the deep mean- 
ing of the old myths and legends, like the Quest of the 
Holy Grail and the Return of Arthur. Last, there was 



22 Introduction 

a patriotic impulse, which made him desire to have a 
hero of his own country and to give in poetry his own 
view of the things which build up or pull down a 
kingdom. 

Of course, with all three of these impulses at work 
in his mind, Tennyson could not take the story just as 
Malory or any one of the old writers gave it. He must 
be free to choose from each of them just as much of 
their material as suited him, and to mould and shape it 
in his own way. Accordingly he went to the Le Morte 
Darthii7- and The Mabinogioii and the other books, as a 
man goes to a quarry to get the stone for a building 
which he has planned. And he did four things with the 
Arthurian story during the long time while he was at 
work upon it. 

First, he brought order into the arrangement of the 
different parts. He gave the story a beginning in The 
Coming of Arthw; and carried it on through the growth 
of the kingdom and the building up of the Round Table ; 
and showed how danger arose through the unlawful love 
of Lancelot and Guinevere ; and how evil came in with 
Vivien to corrupt the hearts and the manners of the 
knights ; and how superstition led them away to follow 
wandering fires in the Quest of the Holy Grail ; and how 
Ettarre and Tristram were false to the law of true love ; 
and how Guinevere was discovered and fled from the 
court in shame ; and how at last the enemies of the king 
triumphed, and the Round Table was dissolved with The 
Passing of Arthur. 



Introduction 23 

Second, he made the figure of Arthur stand out, clear 
and consistent, as the man who built up and supported 
the kingdom. The old writers had really made two 
Arthurs : one, strong and brave and wise and good ; the 
other, weak and wicked and cruel and fooHsh, — a play- 
thing in the hand of Fate. Tennyson chose the good 
Arthur for his hero, and left the other out. 

Third, he gave to his characters the thoughts and feel- 
ings of men and women at the present day ; he made 
them modern people inwardly, while outwardly they wore 
the dress and followed the customs of a past age. This 
was just what each successive writer had done with the 
story. Arthur and his knights belonged to the sixth 
century. But Walter Wace and Chrestien de Troyes 
brought them down to the twelfth century; and Sir 
Thomas Malory made them think and feel Hke people 
of the time of Edward IV. Tennyson did what most 
poets do ; he expressed the ideals of his own age through 
the persons of his poem. Some say that this is a fault ; 
others, that it is a necessity; others, that it is a 
merit. 

Fourth, he gave his fancy free play to adorn his poem 
with all kinds of beautiful description, of scenery, of cos- 
tume, of natural objects, of the looks and actions of men 
and women. Perhaps there is a Httle too much of this in 
some places. But it is like the carving and the coloured 
windows in a great cathedral. Without it the building 
would be bare. 

There is only one thing more that /you need to notice 



24 Introduction • 

about the way in which Tennyson has used the story ; 
that is, his division of the epic into twelve parts called 
idylls. The name comes from the Greek d^vWiov, which 
means "a short poem descriptive -of'some picturesque 
scene or incident, chiefly in rustic life." The marked 
thing about this kind of poetry is the fact that it always 
has a central idea or feeling which colours the picture, 
and brings the scenery and the action into harmony with 
itself. Tennyson had written a number of poems of this 
type, dealing with rural Hfe, which he called English idyls. 
Now he wished to use the same method in dealing with 
the Hfe of the age of chivalry. He proposed, not to tell 
a long, unbroken story, but to present a series of pictures, 
each one controlled and coloured by a central idea, and 
each one showing a distinct stage in the course of the 
plot. They were all to be bound together by the main 
thread of narrative. But at the same time each was to 
have a character of its own, and to be complete in itself, 
as a separate scene in the drama of a kingdom. There- 
fore, he did not call the parts of his poem " books " or 
" cantos," but idylls, because he was using the pictur- 
esque method ; and I suppose he doubled the / in order 
to distinguish them from his simpler, more rustic EngHsh 
idyls. 

At this point I should advise you to stop reading this 
introduction and turn to the three idylls which are in this 
book. Read them for pleasure. Get the pictures before 
your imagination. And then come back, if you will, for 
a little further explanation. 



Introduction 25 

IV. The Meaning of the Idylls 

Tennyson himself has told us what the whole poem 
means. It is a parable of the life of man. Not an alle- 
gory (though there are allegorical passages and features 
in it), because an allegory presents abstract ideas, virtues 
and vices, dressed up in human form and going through 
a kind of masquerade. But a parable, because it is a 
story of living men and women, told so as to teach a les- 
son, and shadow forth a deeper truth. 

"The poem," said he, "is the dream of man coming 
into practical life and ruined by one sin. It is not the 
history of one man or of one generation, but of a whole 
cycle of generations." 

Therefore he tells us that it is not to be taken as a 
piece of history in verse, nor merely as an attempt to 
retell the story of Malory or Geoffrey of Monmouth; 
but as a tale 

" New-old, and shadowing Sense at war with Soul." 

In the king, the hero, the victory is won by the soul ; the 
higher nature rules the ideal man ; he is true always to 
the best that he knows. In Lancelot and Guinevere the 
conflict is uncertain ; the lower nature leads them astray ; 
they are not true to their promises and bonds. In the 
baser characters, like Vivien and Ettarre and Tristram 
and Modred, the sensual side is triumphant ; the lower 
nature rules them ; they are wiUingly false in all things. 
So far as the Round Table is concerned, the weakness 



26 Introduction 

and wickedness of men bring about its ruin. But Guine- 
vere and Lancelot win pardon through repentance ; and 
Arthur triumphs even in death, with a faith which can- 
not be shaken. 

In each of the idylls you see a smaller picture of this 
same war between Sense and Soul. For example, in 
The ComiTig of Arthur the base and unruly knights who 
profess to doubt his royal birth because they do not wish 
to submit to him, are arrayed against the noble knights 
who believe in him and accept him as king. In The 
Holy Grail the conflict is between the faith of Arthur, 
whose religion binds him to stay at home and do his 
duty, and the superstition of the knights, whose religion 
is chiefly an aff'air of miracles and wonders, and leads 
them off on a vain quest, thus helping to break up the 
Round Table. 

Now let us take up the three idylls which we are to 
study, and look at them again in the light of the main 
meaning of the poem. 

Gareth and Lynette. — This story is taken mostly from 
Malory's Le Morte Darthur, Book VII, which " treateth 
of a noble knight called Sir Gareth, and called by Sir 
Kay, Beaumains." But many changes are made by Ten- 
nyson in the telling of the tale, and the first four hundred 
lines are very much like the story of Peredur in The 
Mabinogioii. 

The central thought of the idyll is the conflict between 
a true ambition, which honours the spirit of knighthood 
and is willing to earn its right to rise by the most humble 



Introduction 27 

service, and a false pride, which thinks chiefly of the 
outward trappings of knighthood and despises all who 
are not of high birth and rank. And this is the way the 
thought is worked out. 

Gareth is the youngest son of Lot, King of Orkney, 
and Bellicent, the reputed half-sister of Arthur. Two of 
his brothers, Gawain and Modred, have already gone to 
court and become knights. Gareth wishes to follow them 
and win fame ; but his fond mother keeps him at home. 
He begs her to let him go ; she consents on condition 
that he will take a vow to conceal his name and serve as 
kitchen-boy at court for a year, supposing that this test 
will be too hard for him. But he accepts, and slips away 
in disguise, the same night, with two servants, to Camelot. 
They arrive at the city and are astonished at its wonders. 
The gateway is an allegory. While they are staring at it 
an old man (probably Merlin) appears and talks with 
them, discovering Gareth's secret. They enter the city 
and go into the great hall where Arthur is throned among 
his knights, hearing appeals for justice. Gareth sees the 
blazoned shields of the knights who have done noble 
deeds, and watches the king sending out one after an- 
other to right the wrongs which are brought before him. 
Then Gareth makes his request, that he may serve in the 
kitchen for a year, — afterwards he will tell his name and 
fight for knighthood. It is granted, and he is turned 
over to the charge of sour, surly Kay, the court steward, 
who dislikes and abuses him. But he serves humbly for 
a month, meanwhile proving his great strength in sports 



28 Introduction 

among the servants, and thinking ahvays of the day 
when he shall become a knight. Then his mother re- 
lents, sends him arms, and releases him from his vow. 
He goes to Arthur, reveals his name, and asks to be 
made knight in secret and to be given the first quest. 
The king consents, but tells Lancelot the secret, and 
bids him follow Gareth and see that no harm overtakes 
the bold young knight. Thus far, then, the story shows 
the training of ambition by obedience. 

Now appears at court a damsel called Lynette, beauti- 
ful, high-stepping, narrow-minded, scornful, proud of her 
rank, — a society girl of the olden time. She tells how 
her sister, the Lady Lyonors, is prisoned in her Castle 
Perilous by four wicked knights, and asks for the greatest 
of Arthur's heroes. Sir Lancelot, to ride forth and set her 
free. But Gareth springs up among the servants and 
claims his right to take the first quest. Arthur grants it. 
Lynette is disgusted at having a kitchen knave given to 
her for champion. She runs from the Hall and sets out 
for home. Gareth follows on the horse that Arthur has 
provided, and catches up with her. She refuses his 
escort and insults him. Sir Kay, who has followed to 
punish the insolence of his kitchen boy, attacks Gareth 
and is overthrown. Lynette still mocks him as a scullion, 
but he answers gently and rides after her, proving his 
knighthood by deeds of valour. At last they come to the 
river that runs in three loops around the Castle Perilous. 
Gareth fights and conquers the first of the wicked knights, 
who called himself Sir Morning Star. Lynette is still 



Introduction 29 

scornful, but she relents a little, and advises Gareth not 
to risk his life with the second knight, called Sir Noon- 
day Sun. But the fight comes off and the Sun is beaten. 
Then Lynette relents a little more, and admits that if 
Gareth were nobly born she might like him. He over- 
throws the third knight, Sir Evening Star, and she relents 
altogether, begs Gareth's pardon, and asks him to ride 
beside her. They take refuge for the night in a hermit's 
cave, where there is an allegory carved on the rocks, of 
the war of Time against the human soul. Sir Lancelot, 
who has been delayed in riding after them, comes up, 
and through an error fights with Gareth and overthrows 
him. Lynette is again disgusted, because her champion 
has been beaten ; but when she finds out that the victor 
is the great Sir Lancelot, and that her comrade is Prince 
Gareth, she is reconciled. The next morning they ride 
on to meet the fourth of the wicked knights, who calls 
himself Death. Lynette, loving Gareth, begs him to let 
Lancelot fight, for fear the combat will be too hard. But 
Gareth, fearless, attacks the last foe, who is horribly clad 
in black armour and rides a black horse. At one stroke 
Gareth splits his helmet, and the rosy face of a boy 
appears, — a Httle lad whom the first three knights, his 
brothers, had dressed up in this disguise, thinking that 
terror would prevent men from fighting him. This bloom- 
ing boy may be a symbol of the harmlessness of death ; 
or he may represent Cupid. At all events, Gareth goes 
into the castle, and wins, not only his quest, but also a 
fair lady to wife, — Malory says Lyonors, but Tennyson 



30 Introduction 

s/ys Lynette. Thus the second part of the story shows 
the victory of true nobihty over false pride. 

The season of the idyll is spring and early summer, in 
one of the years when the Round Table was new, and the 
court pure. The tone of the story is all bright and 
hopeful. 

Lancelot and Elaine. — This story is taken mainly 
from Book XVIII of Le Morte Darthur. It was the 
first of the Arthurian legends to attract Tennyson, and 
he retold it in the ballad of The ' Lady of Shalott, 
which was published in 1832. In this form the tale 
comes from an Italian novella, entitled La Damigella 
di Scalot. Lancelot is named in it ; but not Elaine. 
Shalott is Tennyson's softening of the Itahan version of 
Astolat. In the idyll the story is much more fully and 
clearly told than in the ballad. 

The central thought of the idyll is the conflict between 
a pure and simple love, such as Elaine offers to Lancelot, 
and the false, disloyal tie which binds him to the queen, 
and into which pride and jealousy and bitterness have 
already begun to enter. The keynote of the poem is in 
the lines : — 

" His honour rooted in dishonour stood, 
And faith unfaithful kept him falsely true." 

The story opens with a picture of Elaine, the lily maid 
of Astolat, sitting in her tower, guarding a shield which 
belongs to Lancelot, though she does not know the name 
of the knight who has left it in her care. Then the poet 
turns back to tell how the shield came there. 



Introduction 31 

Before Arthur was king, he had found in a lonely glen 
a skeleton with a crown, in which were nine diamonds. 
After he came to the throne he made a tournament, to 
be held each year, with one of the diamonds for the 
prize. Lancelot, the mightiest of the knights, had won 
eight of the diamonds, and kept them until he should 
win the ninth, meaning to give them all to Queen Guine- 
vere. Just before the ninth tournament she pretends to 
be ill, and Lancelot makes believe that he has a wound 
which prevents him from riding, in order that he may 
stay with her. Then she teases him to go to the tourna- 
ment in disguise, and win the diamond without the help 
of his great fame, which makes men afraid of him. 

Lancelot rides off and comes to the lonely old Castle 
of Astolat. The lord of the castle does not know him, 
but welcomes him as a noble guest, and when he explains 
that he wants to borrow a shield, offers to lend him that 
of Sir Torre, the oldest son of the house, who is lame, 
and to send Sir Lavaine, the younger son, with him to 
the tournament as a companion. Meanwhile Elaine, the 
lovely, gentle daughter of the house, who has grown up 
in seclusion, falls in love with the noble, nameless guest. 
He is most courteous to her, and unconsciously wins her 
love and admiration by all his words and actions. When 
Lavaine and he are setting out for the tournament, she 
begs him to wear her "favour," a red sleeve sown with 
pearls, on his helmet in the Hsts. He refuses at first, but 
then, thinking that this will help his disguise, and wishing 
to please a maid so fair and good, he consents. He gives 



32 Introduction 

her his own shield to keep until his return, and so rides 
away with Lavaine. Thus far, then, we have the con- 
trast between the two loves : Guinevere, royal, proud, 
suspicious, exacting ; Elaine, gentle, pure, confiding. 

Lancelot and Lavaine do mighty deeds at the tourna- 
ment ; but because Lancelot appears as a stranger with 
an unknown shield, his own kindred combine against him, 
and he has a hard time to win the contest, being dread- 
fully wounded. When the king proclaims that the prize 
belongs to the knight with the scarlet sleeve on his hel- 
met, Lancelot cannot come to receive it. Lavaine has 
carried him from the field, half dead, to the cave of a 
friendly hermit. Here Lancelot lies for many a week, 
hovering between Hfe and death. 

Meantime there is great wonder at court over the 
total disappearance of the most famous knight. The 
king sends Sir Gawain out with the diamond to find him. 
The queen betrays to the king the secret that Lancelot 
was at the tournament in disguise. The king lets out the 
fact that the strange knight who won and was wounded, 
wore a red sleeve, a lady's favour, on his helmet. At this 
Guinevere's jealousy makes her secretly furious, for she 
judges Lancelot false to her. In contrast with this scene, 
Gawain, riding in search of the stranger knight, comes to 
Astolat, and tells Elaine that he who wore the red sleeve 
was sorely wounded and has vanished. Her only thought 
is one of pity and grief. Gawain stays at the castle and 
makes light love to her. One day she shows him the 
shield that she is keeping, and he recognizes it as Lance- 



Introduction 23 

lot's. She confesses that Lancelot is the only man she 
can ever love. Gawain gives her the diamond and rides 
away. 

Then she goes out to seek for Lancelot, and finds him 
in the hermit's cave. Here she gives him the diamond, 
his prize, and lovingly nurses him back to Hfe. He sees 
her love, and feels that it might have made him happy, 
if it had come sooner ; but now his secret tie binds him 
to the queen. At last the wound is healed ; Lancelot, 
Lavaine, and Elaine ride back to Astolat. Lancelot, 
about to go away, bids her ask for the thing she wishes 
most. She answers " Your love." He tells her gently 
that this cannot be, for he will never marry ; but all that 
he has, even to half his lands, is hers. But of this she 
will have nothing. Then her father begs Lancelot to use 
some discourtesy to break her passion. So Lancelot 
sends for his shield and sadly rides away without looking 
up or even waving his hand in farewell. 

Elaine lives in her tower and pines away, wishing for 
death, since love is denied her. At last she makes her 
father and brothers promise that when she is dead they 
will put a letter, which she has written, in her hand, and 
lay her body in a boat, and let an old dumb servant row 
her up the river to Camelot. The strange funeral arrives 
beneath the palace just as Lancelot has given the dia- 
monds to the queen, and she in a passion of jealous fury, 
has flung them out of the window. They flash and fall 
into the river ; and then across the ripples floats the 
black boat, with the dumb oarsman and the lily maid of 

IDYLLS OF THE KING — 3 



34 Introduction 

Astolat, her letter in her folded hands. They carry her 
into the great hall ; Arthur breaks the seal of the letter. 
It tells simply of her true love for Lancelot, which had 
no return, and begs him to pray for her soul. Then 
Arthur wonders why it was that Lancelot could not love 
a maid so lovable. But Lancelot in his heart ponders on 
the difference between this pure, tender love of Elaine, 
and the jealous, proud passion of Guinevere, and resolves 
to break the bonds that make him false to his king. 
So ends the tale. 

The season is midsummer, and the time is the tenth 
year of Arthur's reign, when evil has already corrupted 
the court and the air is dark and heavy with doubt and 
suspicion. 

The Passing of Arthur. — This idyll corresponds in 
general to Book XXI of Le Morte Darthur. But there 
are many points of difference. Some arise from the 
fact that Malory is closing the story of Lancelot as 
well as the story of Arthur, while Tennyson tells us only 
of the passing away of the king. Others arise from 
the form which Tennyson chose to give to his poem as 
a parable of the life of the soul. Thus he leaves out 
all about Modred's being the unlawful son of Arthur, 
and makes him simply the traitor, leading the forces of 
misrule and rebellion against the king, who stands for 
law and order. He leaves out also what Malory tells 
about the body which was brought by night to the her- 
mit's chapel for burial, and which Sir Bedivere thought 
was the body of Arthur. Tennyson shows us only the 



Introduction ^S 

king sailing away across the lake in the black barge 
tended by the three queens. 

The central thought of the idyll is the old strife 
between Sense and Soul. This is represented, first, in 
the great battle where the forces of evil and misrule 
under Modred fight against the loyal and true knights 
under Arthur. The two hosts destroy each other in a 
wild, dark, confused conflict hidden by a thick mist ; and 
last of all Arthur, himself mortally wounded, strikes down 
the traitor Modred. Then the same strife between Sense 
and Soul is represented, for the second time, in Sir Bedi- 
vere, the last of the Round Table, whom Arthur com- 
mands to throw his sword Excalibur into the lake, from 
which it came long ago by magic. Bedivere, seeing the 
beauty of the jewelled hilt, cannot bear to throw it away ; 
his love of treasure gets the better of his loyalty to the 
king, so he hides the sword in the reeds. But Arthur 
discovers his disobedience, and at last compels him to 
cast the sword into the water. The same strife is repre- 
sented, for the third time, in the conversation between 
the dying king and his last follower, when the black 
barge appears on the lake to carry Arthur away. Bedi- 
vere is a good, plain, faithful man, but he has not the 
strength of spirit to resist the great disasters that have 
befallen the kingdom. He judges by Sense ; the true 
old times are dead forever ; there is nothing before him 
but sorrow and a world all dark. Arthur's faith and 
hope still sustain him : he judges by the Soul ; the old 
order has passed away, but a new order will come, for 



36 Introduction 

God fulfils himself in many ways. Prayer still remains, 
and the vision of a place of rest and healing in the island 
valley of Avilion. So the barge bears him across the 
shining water into the invisible, and the poem closes with 
the far-off echo of victorious music : — 

" Sounds, as if some fair city were one voice 
Around a king returning from his wars." 

V. The Form of the Verse 

The metre in which the Idylls of the King are written 
(except the songs which you will find in them here and 
there) is that which is known in English as blank verse. 
In regular blank verse three things are to be noted. 

1. Rhyme is not used. 

2. The lines are not arranged in fixed groups or 
stanzas. They follow one another line by line, and the 
poet puts as many into a paragraph as he pleases. 

3. The normal or standard line has ten syllables, and 
five stresses or accents, which fall on the even syllables. 
There is usually a slight break in the line, which com- 
monly falls about the middle, but may occur almost any- 
where. At the end of the Hne there is a pause. 

Thus, the following are normal or standard blank verse 
lines : — 

1 2' 3 4'5 6' II 7 8' 9 10' 
Elaine the lily maid of Astolat. 

I 2' 3 4' 5 II 6' 7 8'. 9 10' 
The thrall in person may be free in soul. 

I 2' 34' 5 6' II 7 8' 9 10' 
And God fulfils himself in many ways. 



Introduction 37 

A longer name for this is five-stress iambic unrhymed 
verse} 

It seems a very free form, and at first you would think 
it easy to write. But if you will think more carefully, 
you will see that its very freedom and the plainness of 
the verse make it hard to write well ; for if you had a 
long succession of normal or standard lines, such as those 
which are given above, the effect in reading would be 
very bad, — dull, heavy, monotonous. 

The beauty of blank verse comes from the bringing in 
of slight changes and variations in the regular form of 
the lines. This makes them flow together in musical 
paragraphs and puts a stronger emphasis on important 
words, and generally breaks up the monotony. 

These changes are of three principal kinds : — 

I. A change {a) in the break in the line, or {b) in 
the pause at the end. 

Examples : — 

{a) And uttermost obedience to the King. {^No break.'] 

{a) Gawain, surnamed the Courteous, fair and strong. 

[ Two breaks. ~\ 
(a) How can ye keep me tether'd to you? Shame. 

[Break before last syllable.] 

1 It was first used in Enghsh by the Earl of Surrey (1547) in his 
translation from Virgil's /Eneid. Then it became the common 
form in the dramas of Shakespeare and the writers of the Age of 
Elizabeth. Then Milton used it in his Paradise Lost (1667). 
Then it was less popular for a while, until Thomson (1726) pub- 
lished The Seasojis. In modern times Coleridge, Wordsworth, 
Shelley, Keats, and Matthew Arnold used it well. But the best 
blank verse since Milton is probably that of Tennyson. 



38 Introduction 

(jz) Accursed, who strikes nor lets the hand be seen. 

\^Break after second syllable.'] 

(J>) Allow me for mine hour, and thou wilt find 

My fortunes all as fair as hers who lay 
Among the ashes and wedded the king's son. 

[Here the first two lines have no pause at the end. They are 
called run-on lines. Those with a pause at the end are called 
end-stopt. The change from one to the other of these forms of the 
line is one of the most important variations in blank verse.] 

2. A change in the stress, either {a) by shifting it 
from the even syllable to the odd syllable, {b) by omitting 
it altogether, or (^) by doubling it. 

Examples : — 

i' 23 4' 5 6' 7' 8 9 10' 

{a) What ! shall the shield of Mark stand among these? 

123 4' 5 6' 7 8 9' 10' 
{b) And in the blast and bray of the long horn. (4 stresses.) 

I 2' 3' 4' 5 6' 7 8 9' 10' 

(r) A star shot : " Lo," said Gareth, " the foe falls." (6 stresses.) 

3. A change in the number of syllables in the line. 

Exainples : — 

Down the long avenues of a boundless wood. 

[11 syllables.] 
Camelot, a city of shadowy palaces. 

[13 syllables.] 
[In reading such lines the extra syllables are lightly passed over. 
The effect is to enrich and prolong the line. When the extra syl- 
lable comes at the end of the line, after the final stress, it is called 
a feminine ending.] 



Introduction 39 



Examples : — 



Bearing all down in thy precipitancy. 
Confusion and illusion and relation. 

All these variations from the standard line give a 
changing music to blank verse, and make it, in the hand 
of a master like Tennyson, one of the most beautiful 
and powerful of EngHsh metres. The following passage 
illustrates the way in which the shifting of the breaks 
and pauses gives practically a new structure to the verse. 
The passage is from Gareth aiid Lynette^ 210-226. 

For barefoot on the keystone, 
Which was lined and rippled like an ever-fleeting wave, 

The Lady of the Lake stood : 
All her dress wept from her sides as water flowing away; 

But like the cross 
Her great and goodly arms stretch'd under all the cornice 

And upheld : 
And drops of water fell from either hand; 

And down from one a sword was hung. 

From one a censer. 
Either worn with wind and storm; 
And o'er her breast floated the sacred fish; 
And in the space to left of her, and right, 
Were Arthur's wars in weird devices done. 

New things and old co-twisted, 

As if Time were nothing. 
So inveterately, that men were giddy gazing there; 

And over all high on the top 
Were those three Queens, 
The friends of Arthur, 

Who should help him at his need. 



THE ORDER OF THE 

IDYLLS OF THE KING 

I. THE COMING OF ARTHUR 

II. GARETH AND LYNETTE 

III. THE MARRIAGE OF GERAINT 

IV. GERAINT AND ENID 
V. BALIN AND BALAN 

VI. MERLIN AND VIVIEN 

VII. LANCELOT AND ELAINE 

VIII. THE HOLY GRAIL 

IX. PELLEAS AND ETTARRE 

X. THE LAST TOURNAMENT 

XI. GUINEVERE 

XII. THE PASSING OF ARTHUR 



IDYLLS OF THE KING 

GARETH AND LYNETTE 

The last tall son of Lot and Bellicent, 

And tallest, Gareth, in a showerful spring 

Stared at the spate.^ A slender-shafted Pine 

Lost footing, fell, and so was whirl'd away. 

'How he went down,' said Gareth, 'as a false 

knight 
Or evil king before my lance if lance 
Were mine to use — O senseless cataract, 
Bearing all down in thy precipitancy — 
And yet thou art but swollen with cold snows 
And mine is Hving blood : thou dost His will. 
The Maker's, and not knowest, and I that know, 
Have strength and wit, in my good mother's hall 
Linger with vacillating obedience, 
Prison'd, and kept and coax'd and whistled to — 
Since the good mother holds me still a child ! 
Good mother is bad mother unto me ! 
A worse were better ; yet no worse would I. 
Heaven yield ^ her for it, but in me put force 
To weary her ears with one continuous prayer, 

1 River in flood. 2 Reward. 

41 



42 Idylls of the King 

Until she let me fly discaged to sweep 20 

In ever-highering eagle-circles up 
To the great Sun of Glory, and thence swoop 
Down upon all things base, and dash them dead, 
A knight of Arthur, w^orking out his will. 
To cleanse the world. Why, Gawain, when he came 25 
With Modred hither in the summertime, 
Ask'd me to tilt^ with him, the proven knight. 
Modred for want of w^orthier was the judge. 
Then I so shook him in the saddle, he said, 
'' Thou hast half prevail'd against me," said so — 
he — 30 

Tho' Modred biting his thin lips was mute, 
For he is alway sullen : w^hat care I ? ' 

And Gareth went, and hovering round her chair 
Ask'd, ' Mother, tho' ye count me still the child. 
Sweet mother, do ye love the child ? ' She laugh 'd, 35 
' Thou art but a wild-goose to question it.' 
' Then, mother, and ye love the child,' he said, 
' Being a goose and rather tame than wild. 
Hear the child's story.' ' Yea, my w^ell-beloved. 
An 'twere but of the goose and golden eggs.' 40 

And Gareth answer'd her with kindling eyes, 
' Nay, nay, good mother, but this egg of mine 
Was finer gold than any goose can lay ; 
For this an Eagle, a royal Eagle, laid 

1 Contend with the lance, on horseback. 



i 



Gareth and Lynette 43 

Almost beyond eye-reach, on such a palm 45 

As glitters gilded in thy Book of Hours. ^ 

And there was ever haunting round the palm 

A lusty youth, but poor, who often saw 

The splendour sparkling from aloft, and thought 

" An I could climb and lay my hand upon it, 50 

Then were I wealthier than a leash - of kings." 

But ever when he reach'd a hand to cHmb, 

One that had loved him from his childhood, caught 

And stay'd him, " Climb not lest thou break thy neck, 

I charge thee by my love," and so the boy, 55 

Sweet mother, neither clomb, nor brake his neck, 

And brake his very heart in pining for it, 

And past away.' 

To whom the mother said, 
' True love, sweet son, had risk'd himself and climb'd, 
And handed down the golden treasure to him.' 60 

And Gareth answer'd her with kindling eyes, 
' Gold ? said I gold ? — ay then, why he, or she. 
Or whosoe'er it was, or half the world 
Had ventured — /lad the thing I spake of been 
Mere gold — but this was all of that true steel, 65 

Whereof they forged the brand ^ Excalibur, 
And lightnings play'd about it in the storm, 
And all the little fowl were flurried at it, 
And there were cries and clashings in the nest, 
That sent him from his senses : let me go.' 70 

1 Prayer-book with painted margins. ^ Three. ^ Sword. 



44 Idylls of the King 

Then Bellicent bemoan'd herself and said, 
' Hast thou no pity upon my loneliness ? 
Lo, where thy father Lot beside the hearth 
Lies like a log, and all but smoulder'd out ! 
For ever since when traitor to the King 75 

He fought against him in the Barons' war, 
And Arthur gave him back his territory, 
His age hath slowly droopt, and now lies there 
A yet-warm corpse, and yet unburiable. 
No more ; nor sees, nor hears, nor speaks, nor knows. 80 
And both thy brethren are in Arthur's hall. 
Albeit^ neither loved with that full love 
I feel for thee, nor worthy such a love : 
Stay therefore thou ; red berries charm the bird. 
And thee, mine innocent, the jousts,^ the wars, 85 

Who never knewest finger-ache, nor pang 
Of wrench'd or broken limb — an often chance 
In those brain-stunning shocks, and tourney-falls,^ 
Frights to my heart ; but stay : follow the deer 
By these tall firs and our fast-falling burns i"* 90 

So make thy manhood mightier day by day ; 
Sweet is the chase : and I will seek thee out 
Some comfortable bride and fair, to grace 
Thy climbing life, and cherish my prone ^ year, 
Till falling into Lot's forgetfulness 95 

1 Although. 2 A knightly contest, usually with blunted weapons. 
^ Falls given in a tournament, where a number of knights con- 
tended. 

* Small streams. ^ Advancing age. 



Gareth and Lynette 45 

I know not thee, myself, nor anything. 

Stay, my best son ! ye are yet more boy than man.' 

Then Gareth, ' An ye hold me yet for child, 
Hear yet once more the story of the child. 
For, mother, there was once a King, like ours. 100 

The prince his heir, when tall and marriageable, 
Ask'd for a bride ; and thereupon the King 
Set two before him. One was fair, strong, arm'd — 
But to be won by force — and many men 
Desired her ; one, good lack,^ no man desired, 105 

And these were the conditions of the King : 
That save he won the first by force, he needs 
Must wed that other, whom no man desired, 
A red-faced bride who knew herself so vile, 
That evermore she long'd to hide herself, no 

Nor fronted man or woman, eye to eye — 
Yea — some she cleaved to, but they died of her. 
And one — they call'd her Fame ; and one, — O 

mother, 
How can ye keep me tether'd to you — Shame. 
Man am I grown, a man's work must I do. 115 

Follow the deer ? follow the Christ, the King, 
Live pure, speak true, right wrong, follow the King — 
Else, wherefore born ? ' 

To whom the mother said, 
' Sweet son, for there be many who deem him not, 

1 What a pity ! 



46 Idylls of the King 

Or will not deem him, wholly proven King — 120 

Albeit in mine own heart I knew him King, 

When I was frequent^ with him in my youth, 

And heard him Kingly speak, and doubted him 

No more than he, himself ; but felt him mine, 

Of closest kin to me : yet — wilt thou leave 125 

Thine easeful biding - here, and risk thine all, 

Life, limbs, for one that is not proven King ? 

Stay, till the cloud that settles round his birth 

Hath lifted but a little. Stay, sweet son.' 

And Gareth answer'd quickly, ' Not an hour, 130 

So that ye yield me — I will walk thro' fire, 
Mother, to gain it — your full leave to go. 
Not proven, who swept the dust of ruin'd Rome 
From off the threshold of the realm, and crush'd 
The Idolaters, and made the people free ? 135 

Who should be King save him who makes us free ? ' 

So when the Queen, who long had sought in vain 
To break him from the intent to which he grew. 
Found her son's will unwaveringly one, 
She answer'd craftily, ' Will ye walk thro' fire ? 140 

Who walks thro' fire will hardly heed the smoke. 
Ay, go then, an ye must: only one proof, 
Before thou ask the King to make thee knight, 
Of thine obedience and thy love to me. 
Thy mother, — I demand.' 145 

1 Accustomed to be. ^ Comfortable home. 



Gareth and Lynette 47 

And Gareth cried, 
' A hard one, or a hundred, so I go. 
Nay — quick ! the proof to prove me to the quick ! ' ^ 

But slowly spake the mother looking at him, 
' Prince, thou shalt go disguised to Arthur's hall. 
And hire thyself to serve for meats and drinks 150 

Among the scullions and the kitchen-knaves," 
And those that hand the dish across the bar.^ 
Nor shalt thou tell thy name to any one. 
And thou shalt serve a twelvemonth and a day.' 

For so the Queen believed that when her son 155 

Beheld his only way to glory lead 
Low down thro' villain ^ kitchen-vassalage, 
Her own true Gareth was too princely-proud 
To pass thereby ; so should he rest with her, 
Closed in her castle from the sound of arms. 160 

Silent awhile was Gareth, then replied, 
' The thrall ^ in person may be free in soul. 
And I shall see the jousts. Thy son am I, 
And since thou art my mother, must obey. 
I therefore yield me freely to thy will ; 165 

For hence will I, disguised, and hire myself 
To serve with scullions and with kitchen-knaves ; 
Nor tell my name to any — no, not the King.' 

1 Try my very life. ^ Kitchen boys. 

^ Counter, dividing kitchen from eating-place. 

* Servile. ^ A slave, one who runs of errands. 



48 Idylls of the King 

Gareth awhile linger'd. The mother's eye 
Full of the wistful fear that he would go, 170 

And turning toward him wheresoe'er he turn'd, 
Perplext his outward purpose, till an hour, 
When waken'd by the wind which with full voice 
Swept bellowing thro' the darkness on to dawn, 
He rose, and out of slumber calling two 175 

That still had tended on him from his birth, 
Before the wakeful mother heard him, went. 

The three were clad like tillers of the soil. 
Southward they set their faces. The birds made 
Melody on branch, and melody in mid air. 180 

The damp hill-slopes were quicken 'd into green. 
And the live green had kindled into flowers, 
For it was past the time of Easterday. 

So, when their feet were planted on the plain 
That broaden 'd toward the base of Camelot, 185 

Far off they saw the silver-misty morn 
Rolling her smoke about the Royal mount. 
That rose between the forest and the field. 
At times the summit of the high city flash 'd ; 
At times the spires and turrets half-way down 190 

Prick'd thro' the mist ; at times the great gate shone 
Only, that open'd on the field below : 
Anon, the whole fair city had disappear'd. 

Then those who went with Gareth were amazed. 
One crying, ' Let us go no further, lord. 195 



Gareth and Lynette 49 

Here is a city of Enchanters, built 

By fairy Kings.' The second echo'd him, 

' Lord, we have heard from our wise man at home 

To Northward, that this King is not the King, 

But only changeling out of Fairyland, 200 

Who drave the heathen hence by sorcery 

And Merlin's glamour.' ^ Then the first again, 

' Lord, there is no such city anywhere, 

But all a vision.' 

Gareth answer'd them 
With laughter, swearing he had glamour enow ^ 205 

In his own blood, his princedom, youth and hopes, 
To plunge old Merlin in the Arabian sea ; 
So push'd them all unwilling toward the gate. 
And there was no gate like it under heaven. 
For barefoot on the keystone, which was lined 2x0 

And rippled like an ever-fleeting wave, 
The Lady of the Lake stood : all her dress 
Wept from her sides as water flowing away ; 
But like the cross her great and goodly arms 
Stretch 'd under all the cornice and upheld : 215 

And drops of water fell from either hand ; 
And down from one a sword was hung, from one 
A censer, either worn with wind and storm ; 
And o'er her breast floated the sacred fish ; 
And in the space to left of her, and right , 220 

Were Arthur's wars in weird devices done, 

1 Enchantment. ^ Enough. 

HJYLLS OF THE KING — 4 



50 Idylls of the King 

New things and old co-twisted, as if Time 

Were notliing, so inveterately,^ that men 

Were giddy gazing there ; and over all 

High on the top were those three Queens, the friends 225 

Of Arthur, who should help him at his need. 

Then those with Gareth for so long a space 
Stared at the figures, that at last it seem'd 
The dragon-boughts ^ and elvish emblemings ^ 
Began to move, seethe, twine and curl : they call'd 230 
To Gareth, ' Lord, the gateway is alive.' 

And Gareth likewise on them fixt his eyes 
So long, that ev'n to him they seem'd to move. 
Out of the city a blast of music peal'd. 
Back from the gate started the three, to whom 235 

From out thereunder came an ancient man, 
Long-bearded, saying, ' Who be ye, my sons ? ' 

Then Gareth, ' We be tillers of the soil, 
Who leaving share ^ in furrow come to see 
The glories of our King : but these, my men, 240 

(Your city moved so weirdly in the mist) 
Doubt if the King be King at all, or come 
From Fairyland ; and whether this be built 
By magic, and by fairy Kings and Queens ; 

1 Antiquely, in an ancient manner : or perhaps, obstinately, 
firmly. ^ Coils of the dragons' tails. 

3 Figures like elves or fairies. * Ploughshare. 



J 



Gareth and Lynette 51 

Or whether there be any city at all, 245 

Or all a vision : and this music now 

Hath scared them both, but tell thou these the truth.' 

Then that old Seer made answer playing on him 
And saying, ' Son, I have seen the good ship sail 
Keel upward,^ and mast downward, in the heavens, 250 
And solid turrets topsy-turvy in air : 
And here is truth ; but an it please thee not. 
Take thou the truth as thou hast told it me. 
For truly as thou sayest, a Fairy King 
And Fairy Queens have built the city, son ; 255 

They came from out a sacred mountain-cleft 
Toward the sunrise, each with harp in hand, 
And built it to the music of their harps. 
And, as thou sayest, it is enchanted, son, 
For there is nothing in it as it seems 260 

Saving the King ; tho' some there be that hold 
The King a shadow, and the city real : 
Yet take thou heed of him, for, so thou pass 
Beneath this archway, then wilt thou become 
A thrall to his enchantments, for the King 265 

Will bind thee by such vows, as is a shame 
A man should not be bound by, yet the which 
No man can keep ; but, so thou dread to swear, 
Pass not beneath this gateway, but abide 
Without, among the cattle of the field. 270 

For an ye heard a music, like enow 

1 A mirage. 



52 Idylls of the King 

They are building still, seeing the city is built 
To music, therefore never built at all, 
And therefore built for ever,' 

Gareth spake 
Anger'd, ' Old Master, reverence thine own beard 275 
That looks as white as utter truth, and seems 
Wellnigh as long as thou art statured tall ! 
Why mockest thou the stranger that hath been 
To thee fair-spoken ? ' 

But the Seer replied, 
' Know ye not then the Riddling of the Bards ? ^ 28c 
'' Confusion, and illusion, and relation. 
Elusion, and occasion, and evasion " ? 
I mock thee not but as thou mockest me, 
And all that see thee, for thou art not who 
Thou seemest, but I know thee who thou art. 285 

And now thou goest up to mock the King, 
Who cannot brook ^ the shadow of any lie.' 

Unmockingly the mocker ending here 
Turn'd to the right, and past along the plain ; 
Whom Gareth looking after said, ' My men, 290 

Our one white lie sits like a little ghost 
Here on the threshold of our enterprise. 
Let love be blamed for it, not she, nor I : 
Well, we will make amends.' 

1 Mystical triplets of the old Welsh poets. ^ Endure. 



Gareth and Lynette ^2 

With all good cheer 
He spake and laugh'd, then enter'd with his twain 295 
Camelot, a city of shadowy palaces 
And stately, rich in emblem and the work 
Of ancient kings who did their days in stone ; ^ 
Which Merlin's hand, the Mage- at Arthur's court, 
Knowing all arts, had touch 'd, and everywhere 300 

At Arthur's ordinance, tipt with lessening peak 
And pinnacle, and had made it spire to heaven. 
And ever and anon a knight would pass 
Outward, or inward to the hall : his arms 
Clash'd ; and the sound was good to Gareth's ear. 305 
And out of bower and casement shyly glanced 
Eyes of pure women, wholesome stars of love ; 
And all about a healthful people stept 
As in the presence of a gracious king. 

Then into hall Gareth ascending heard 310 

A voice, the voice of Arthur, and beheld 
Far over heads in that long-vaulted hall 
The splendour of the presence of the King 
Throned, and delivering doom " — and look'd no more — 
But felt his young heart hammering in his ears, 315 

And thought, ' For this half-shadow of a lie 
The truthful King will doom me when I speak.' 
Yet pressing on, tho' all in fear to find 
Sir Gawain or Sir Modred, saw nor one 

1 Carved scenes from their history. 2 ^viaster of supernatural 

wisdom. ^ Judgement on cases brought before him. 



54 Idylls of the King 

Nor other, but in all the listening eyes 320 

Of those tall knights, that ranged about the throne, J 

Clear honour shining hke the dewy star 1 

Of dawn, and faith in their great King, with pure 

Affection, and the light of victory. 

And glory gain'd, and evermore to gain. 325 

Then came a widow crying to the King, 
' A boon. Sir King ! Thy father, Uther, reft^ 
From my dead lord a field with violence : 
For howsoe'er at first he proffer'd gold, 
Yet, for the field was pleasant in our eyes, 330 

We yielded not ; and then he reft us of it 
Perforce, and left us neither gold nor field.' 

Said Arthur, ' Whether would ye ? gold or field ? ' 
To whom the woman w^eeping, ' Nay, my lord, 
The field was pleasant in my husband's eye.' 335 

And Arthur, ' Have thy pleasant field again, 
And thrice the gold for Uther's use thereof, 
According to the years. No boon is here, 
But justice, so thy say be proven true. 
Accursed, who from the wrongs his father did 34c 

Would shape himself a right ! ' 

And while she past, 
Came yet another widow crying to him, 
1 Took away. 



i 



Gareth and Lynette ^^ 

'A boon, Sir King! Thine enemy, King, am I. 

With thine own hand thou slewest my dear lord, 

A knight of Uther in the Barons' war, 345 

When Lot and many another rose and fought 

Against thee, saying thou wert basely born. 

I held with these, and loathe to ask thee aught. 

Yet lo ! my husband's brother had my son 

Thrall'd in his castle, and hath starved him dead ; 350 

And standeth seized ^ of that inheritance 

Which thou that slev/est the sire hast left the son. 

So tho' I scarce can ask it thee for hate. 

Grant me some knight to do the battle for me, 

Kill the foul thief, and wreak ^ me for my son.' 355 

Then strode a good knight forward, crying to him, 
' A boon. Sir King ! I am her kinsman, I. 
Give me to right her wrong, and slay the man.' 

Then came Sir Kay, the seneschal, and cried, 
' A boon. Sir King ! ev'n that thou grant her none, 360 
This railer, that hath mock'd thee in full hall — 
None ; or the wholesome boon of gyve^ and gag.' 

But Arthur, ' We sit King, to help the wrong'd 
Thro' all our realm. The woman loves her lord. 
Peace to thee, woman, with thy loves and hates ! 365 
The kings of old had doom'd thee to the flames, 

^ Is in possession. 2 Avenge. ^ Fetter. 



56 Idylls of the King 

Aurelius Emrys would have scourged thee dead, 

And Uther sHt thy tongue : but get thee hence — 

Lest that rough humour ^ of the kings of old 

Return upon me ! Thou that art her kin, 370 

Go likewise ; lay him low and slay him not, 

But bring him here, that I may judge the right, 

According to the justice of the King : 

Then, be he guilty, by that deathless King^ 

Who lived and died for men, the man shall die.' 375 

Then came in hall the messenger of Mark, 
A name of evil savour in the land, 
The Cornish king. In either hand he bore 
What dazzled all, and shone far-off as shines 
A field of charlock ^ in the sudden sun 380 

Between two showers, a cloth of palest gold, 
Which down he laid before the throne, and knelt, 
Delivering,'' that his lord, the vassal ^ king. 
Was ev'n upon his way to Camelot ; 
For having heard that Arthur of his grace 385 

Had made his goodly cousin, Tristram, knight, 
And, for himself was of the greater state. 
Being a king, he trusted his liege-lord 
Would yield him this large honour all the more ; 
So pray'd him well to accept this cloth of gold, 390 

In token of true heart and fealty. 

1 Mood, temper. 2 Christ. ^ Wild mustard, a yellow weed. 
* Announcing. ^ Holding lands under a superior, to whom 

service must be rendered. 



Gareth and Lynette 57 

Then Arthur cried to rend the cloth, to rend 
In pieces, and so cast it on the hearth. 
An oak-tree smoulder'd there. ' The goodly knight ! 
What ! shall the shield of Mark stand among these ? ' 395 
For, midway down the side of that long hall 
A stately pile,^ — whereof along the front. 
Some blazon'd,^ some but carven, and some blank, 
There ran a treble range of stony shields, — 
Rose, and high-arching overbrow'd" the hearth. 400 

And under every shield a knight was named : 
For this was Arthur's custom in his hall ; 
When some good knight had done one noble deed, 
His arms were carven only ; but if twain 
His arms were blazon 'd also ; but if none, 405 

The shield was blank and bare without a sign 
Saving the name beneath ; and Gareth saw 
The shield of Gawain blazon'd rich and bright. 
And Modred's blank as death ; and Arthur cried 
To rend the cloth and cast it on the hearth. 410 

' More like are we to reave "* him of his crown 
Than make him knight because men call him king. 
The kings we found, ye know we stay'd their hands 
From war among themselves, but left them kings ; 
Of whom were any bounteous, merciful, 415 

Truth-speaking, brave, good livers, them we enroll'd 
Among us, and they sit within our hall. 

1 Building. 2 Marked with a coat of arms in colours. 

3 Hung above. * Deprive. 



58 Idylls of the King 

But Mark hath tarnish 'd the great name of king, 
As Mark would sully the low state of churl : ^ 
And, seeing he hath sent us cloth of gold, 420 

Return, and meet, and hold him from our eyes, 
Lest we should lap" him up in cloth of lead, 
Silenced for ever — craven^ — a man of plots, 
Crafts, poisonous counsels, wayside ambushings — 
No fault of thine : let Kay the seneschal 425 

Look to thy wants, and send thee satisfied — 
Accursed, who strikes nor lets the hand be seen ! ' 

And many another suppliant crying came 
With noise ^ of ravage wrought by beast and man, 
And evermore a knight would ride away. 430 

Last, Gareth leaning both hands heavily 
Down on the shoulders of the twain, his men, 
Approach'd between them toward the King, and ask'd, 
' A boon, Sir King (his voice was all ashamed). 
For see ye not how weak and hungerworn 435 

I seem — leaning on these ? grant me to serve 
For meat and drink among thy kitchen-knaves 
A twelvemonth and a day, nor seek my name. 
Hereafter I will fight.' 

To him the King, 
* A goodly youth and worth a goodlier boon ! 440 

But so thou wilt no goodlier, then must Kay, 
The master of the meats and drinks, be thine.' 

1 Peasant. 2 Wrap. ^ a coward. ^ Report. 



Gareth and Lynette 59 

He rose and past ; then Kay, a man of mien ^ 
Wan-sallow ^ as the plant that feels itself 
Root-bitten by white lichen, 

' Lo ye now ! 445 

This fellow hath broken from some Abbey ,^ where, 
God wot, he had not beef and brewis ^ enow, 
However that might chance ! but an he work, 
Like any pigeon will I cram his crop. 
And sleeker shall he shine than any hog.' 450 

Then Lancelot standing near, ' Sir Seneschal, 
Sleuth-hound ^ thou knowest, and gray, and all the hounds; 
A horse thou knowest, a man thou dost not know : 
Broad brows and fair, a fluent hair and fine. 
High nose, a nostril large and fine, and hands 455 

Large, fair and fine ! — Some young lad's mystery — 
But, or from sheepcot or king's hall, the boy 
Is noble-natured. Treat him with all grace. 
Lest he should come to shame thy judging of him.* 

Then Kay, ' What murmurest thou of mystery ? 460 
Think ye this fellow will poison the King's dish ? 
Nay, for he spake too fool-like : mystery ! 
Tut, an the lad were noble, he had ask'd 
For horse and armour : fair and fine, forsooth ! 

1 Looks. 2 Pale and yellow. 

^ Dwelling of a company of monks. 

* Bread soaked in broth. ^ Blood-hound. 



6o Idylls of the King 

Sir Fine-face, Sir Fair-hands ? but see thou to it 465 
That thine own fineness, Lancelot, some fine day 
Undo thee not — and leave my man to me.' 

So Gareth all for glory underwent 
The sooty yoke of kitchen-vassalage ; 
Ate with young lads his portion by the door, 470 

And couch'd at night with grimy kitchen-knaves. 
And Lancelot ever spake him pleasantly, 
But Kay the seneschal, who loved him not, 
Would hustle and harry him, and labour him 
Beyond his comrade of the hearth, and set 475 

To turn the broach,^ draw water, or hew^ wood. 
Or grosser tasks ;^^and Gareth bow'd himself 
With all obedience to the King, and wrought 
All kind of service with a noble ease 
That graced the lowliest act in doing it^ -480 

And when the thralls had talk among themselves. 
And one would praise the love that linkt the King 
And Lancelot — how the King had saved his life 
In battle twice, and Lancelot once the King's — 
For Lancelot was the first in Tournament, 485 

But Arthur mightiest on the battle-field — 
Gareth was glad. Or if some other told. 
How once the wandering forester at dawn, 
Far over the blue tarns - and hazy seas. 
On Caer-Eryri's highest found the King, 490 

A naked babe, of whom the Prophet spake, 

1 Spit, for roasting meats. ^ Small mountain-lake. 



Gareth and Lynette 6i 

' He passes to the Isle Avilion, 

He passes and is heal'd and cannot die ' — 

Gareth was glad. But if their talk were foul, 

Then would he whistle rapid as any lark, 495 

Or carol some old roundelay,^ and so loud 

That first they mock'd, but, after, reverenced him. 

Or Gareth telling some prodigious tale 

Of knights, who sliced a red life-bubbling way 

Thro' twenty folds of twisted dragon, held 500 

All in a gap-mouth'd circle his good mates 

Lying or sitting round him, idle hands, 

Charm'd ; till Sir Kay, the seneschal, would come 

Blustering upon them, like a sudden wind 

Among dead leaves, and drive them all apart. 505 

Or when the thralls had sport among themselves. 

So there were any trial of mastery, 

He, by two yards in casting bar or stone 

Was counted best ; and if there chanced a joust, 

So that Sir Kay nodded him leave to go, 510 

Would hurry thither, and when he saw the knights 

Clash like the coming and retiring wave. 

And the spear spring, and good horse reel, the boy 

Was half beyond himself for ecstasy. 

So for a month he wrought among the thralls ; 515 
But in the weeks that follow'd, the good Queen,^ 
Repentant of the word she made him swear, 
And saddening in her childless castle, sent, 

1 Simple melody. 2 Bellicent. 



62 Idylls of the King 

Between the in-crescent^ and de-crescent^ moon, 
Arms for her son, and loosed him from his vow. 520 

This, Gareth hearing from a squire ^ of Lot 
With whom he used to play at tourney once. 
When both were children, and in lonely haunts 
Would scratch a ragged oval on the sand, 
And each at either dash from either end — 525 

Shame never made girl redder than Gareth joy. 
He laugh'd ; he sprang. ' Out of the smoke, at once 
I leap from Satan's foot to Peter's knee"^ — 
These news be mine, none other's — nay, the King's — 
Descend into the city/ ' whereon he sought 530 

The King alone, and found, and told him all. 

' I have stagger'd thy strong Gawain in a tilt 
For pastime ; yea, he said it : joust can I. 
Make me thy knight — in secret ! let my name 
Be hidd'n, and give me the first quest,^ I spring 535 
Like flame from ashes.' 

Here the King's calm eye 
Fell on, and check'd, and made him flush, and bow 
Lowly, to kiss his hand, who answer'd him, 
' Son, the good mother let me know thee here. 
And sent her wish that I would yield thee thine. 540 

1 Young. 2 Old. 3 A knight's attendant, armour-bearer. 

* From hell to heaven. 

^ The act of seeking : a commission to go out on a certain errand 
for the king. 



Gareth and Lynette 6^ 

Make thee my knight ? my knights are sworn to vows 
Of utter hardihood, utter gentleness, 
And, loving, utter faithfulness in love. 
And uttermost obedience to the King.' 

Then Gareth, lightly springing from his knees, 545 
' My King, for hardihood I can promise thee. 
For uttermost obedience make demand 
Of whom ye gave me to, the Seneschal, 
No mellow master of the meats and drinks ! 
And as for love, God wot,^ I love not yet, 550 

But love I shall, God willing.' 

And the King — 
' Make thee my knight in secret ? yea, but he, 
Our noblest brother, and our truest man, 
And one with me in all, he needs must know.' 

' Let Lancelot know, my King, let Lancelot know, 555 
Thy noblest and thy truest ! ' 

And the King — 
' But wherefore would ye men should wonder at you ? 
Nay, rather for the sake of me, their King, 
And the deed's sake my knighthood do the deed, 
Than to be noised of.' 

Merrily Gareth ask'd, 560 

' Have I not earn'd my cake in baking of it ? 
Let be my name until I make my name ! 
My deeds will speak; it is but for a day.' 

1 Knows. 



64 Idylls of the King 

So with a kindly hand on Gareth's arm 

Smiled the great King, and half-unwillingly 565 

Loving his lusty youthhood yielded to him. 

Then, after summoning Lancelot privily, 

' I have given him the first quest : he is not proven. 

Look therefore when he calls for this in hall, 

Thou get to horse and follow him far away. 570 

Cover the lions on thy shield, and see 

Far as thou mayest, he be nor ta'en nor slain.' 

Then that same day there past into the hall 
A damsel of high lineage, and a brow 
May-blossom,^ and a cheek of apple-blossom, 575 

Hawk-eyes ; and lightly was her slender nose 
Tip-tilted like the petal of a flower ; 
She into hall past with her page and cried, 

' O King, for thou hast driven the foe without, 
See to the foe within ! bridge, ford, beset 580 

By bandits, everyone that owns a tower 
The Lord for half a league. Why sit ye there ? 
Rest would I not. Sir King, an I were king. 
Till ev'n the lonest hold ^ were all as free 
From cursed bloodshed, as thine altar-cloth 585 

From that best blood '^ it is a sin to spill' 

' Comfort thyself,' said Arthur, ' I nor mine 
Rest : so my knighthood keep the vows they swore, 

1 White as hawthorn flowers. - Dwelling. 

^ The wine of the sacrament. 



Gareth and Lynette 6^ 

The wastest moorland of our realm shall be 

Safe, damsel, as the centre of this hall. 590 

What is thy name ? thy need ? ' 

' My name ? ' she said — 
' Lynette my name ; noble ; my need, a knight, 
To combat for my sister, Lyonors, 
A lady of high lineage, of great lands, 
And comely, yea, and comelier than myself. 595 

She lives in Castle Perilous : a river 
Runs in three loops about her living place ; 
And o'er it are three passings, and three knights 
Defend the passings, brethren, and a fourth 
And of that four the mightiest, holds her stayed ^ 600 
In her own castle, and so besieges her 
To break her will, and make her wed with him : 
And but delays his purport till thou send 
To do the battle with him, thy chief man 
Sir Lancelot whom he trusts to overthrow, 605 

Then wed, with glory : but she will not wed 
Save whom she loveth, or a holy life.- 
Now therefore have I come for Lancelot.' 

Then Arthur mindful of Sir Gareth ask'd, 
' Damsel, ye know this Order lives to crush 610 

All wrongers of the Realm. But say, these four, 
Who be they ? What the fashion of the men ? ' 

1 Imprisoned. 2 'phg ijfg of a nun, 

IDYLLS OF THE KING — 5 



66 Idylls of the King 

* They be of foolish fashion, O Sir King, 
The fashion of that old knight-errantry 
Who ride abroad, and do but what they will ; 615 

Courteous or bestial from the moment, such 
As have nor law nor king ; and three of these 
Proud in their fantasy call themselves the Day, 
Morning-Star, and Noon-Sun, and Evening-Star, 
Being strong fools ; and never a whit more wise 620 

The fourth, who always rideth arm'd in black, 
A huge man-beast of boundless savagery. 
He names himself the Night and oftener Death, 
And wears a helmet mounted with a skull, 
And bears a skeleton figured on his arms, 625 

To show that who may slay or scape the three. 
Slain by himself, shall enter endless night. 
And all these four be fools, but mighty men. 
And therefore am I come for Lancelot.' 

Hereat Sir Gareth call'd from where he rose, 630 

A head with kindling eyes above the throng, 
' A boon, Sir King — this quest ! ' then — for he mark'd 
Kay near him groaning like a wounded bull — 
' Yea, King, thou knowest thy kitchen-knave am I, 
And mighty thro' thy meats and drinks am I, 635 

And I can topple over a hundred such. 
Thy promise. King,' and Arthur glancing at him, 
Brought down a momentary brow. ' Rough, sudden, 
And pardonable, worthy to be knight — 
Go therefore,' and all hearers were amazed. 640 



i 



Gareth and Lynette 67 

But on the damsel's forehead shame, pride, wrath 
Slew the May-white : ^ she lifted either arm, 
' Fie on thee, King ! I ask'd for thy chief knight, 
And thou hast given me but a kitchen-knave.' 
Then ere a man in hall could stay her, turn'd, 645 

Fled down the lane of access to the King, 
Took horse, descended the slope street, and past 
The weird white gate, and paused without, beside 
The field of tourney, murmuring ' kitchen-knave.' 

Now two great entries open'd from the hall, 650 

At one end one that gave upon a range 
Of level pavement where the King would pace 
At sunrise, gazing over plain and wood ; 
And down from this a lordly stairway sloped 
Till lost in blowing trees and tops of towers ; 655 

And out by this main doorway past the King. 
But one was counter ^ to the hearth, and rose 
High that the highest-crested helm could ride 
Therethro' nor graze : and by this entry fled 
The damsel in her wrath, and on to this 660 

Sir Gareth strode, and saw without the door 
King Arthur's gift, the worth of half a town, 
A warhorse of the best, and near it stood 
The two that out of north had follow 'd him : 
This bare a maiden ^ shield, a casque ; '* that held 665 
The horse, the spear ; whereat Sir Gareth loosed 
A cloak that dropt from collar-bone to heel, 

1 She blushed with anger. 2 Opposite. ^ Blank. * Helmet. 



68 Idylls of the King 

A cloth of roughest web, and cast it down, 

And from it like a fuel-smother 'd fire, 

That lookt half-dead, brake bright, and flash 'd as those 

Dull-coated things,^ that making slide apart 671 

Their dusk wing-cases, all beneath there burns 

A jewell'd harness, ere they pass and fly. 

So Gareth ere he parted flash 'd in arms. 

Then as he donn'd^ the helm, and took the shield 675 

And mounted horse and graspt a spear, of grain ^ 

Storm-strengthen 'd on a windy site, and tipt 

With trenchant steel, around him slowly prest 

The people, while from out of kitchen came 

The thralls in throng, and seeing who had work'd 680 

Lustier than any, and whom they could but love, 

Mounted in arms, threw up their caps and cried, 

' God bless the King, and all his fellowship ! ' 

And on thro' lanes of shouting Gareth rode 

Down the slope street, and past without the gate. 685 

So Gareth past with joy ; but as the cur 
Pluckt from the cur he fights with, ere his cause 
Be cool'd by fighting, follows, being named, 
His owner, but remembers all, and growls 
Remembering, so Sir Kay beside the door 690 

Mutter'd in scorn of Gareth whom he used 
To harry and hustle. 

' Bound upon a quest 
With horse and arms — the King hath past his time — 
1 Beetles. ^ Put on. *^ The fibre of the wood. 



Gareth and Lynette 69 

My scullion knave ! Thralls to your work again, 

For an your fire be low ye kindle mine ! 695 

Will there be dawn in West and eve in East ? 

Begone ! — my knave ! — belike and like enow 

Some old head-blow not heeded in his youth 

So shook his wits they wander in his prime — 

Crazed ! How the villain lifted up his voice, 700 

Nor shamed to bawl himself a kitchen-knave. 

Tut : he was tame and meek enow with me. 

Till peacock'd ^ up with Lancelot's noticing. 

Well — I will after my loud knave, and learn 

Whether he know me for his master yet. 705 

Out of the smoke he came, and so my lance 

Hold, by God's grace, he shall into the mire — 

Thence, if the King awaken from his craze, 

Into the smoke again.' 

But Lancelot said, 
' Kay, wherefore wilt thou go against the King, 710 

For that did never he whereon ye rail. 
But ever meekly served the King in thee ? 
Abide : take counsel ; for this lad is great 
And lusty, and knowing both of lance and sword.' 
' Tut, tell not me,' said Kay, ' ye are overfine 715 

To mar stout knaves with foolish courtesies : ' 
Then mounted, on thro' silent faces rode 
Down the slope city, and out beyond the gate. 

1 Made vain. 



70 Idylls of the King 

But by the field of tourney lingering yet 
Mutter'd the damsel, ' Wherefore did the King 720 

Scorn me? for, were Sir Lancelot lackt, at least 
He might have yielded to me one of those 
Who tilt for lady's love and glory here, 
Rather than — O sweet heaven ! O fie upon him — 
His kitchen-knave.' 

To whom Sir Gareth drew 725 

(And there were none but few ^ goodlier than he) 
Shining in arms, ' Damsel, the quest is mine. 
Lead, and I follow.' She thereat, as one 
That smells a foul-flesh'd agaric - in the holt,^ 
And deems it carrion of some woodland thing, 730 

Or shrew, or weasel, nipt her slender nose 
With petulant thumb and finger, shrilling, ' Hence ! 
Avoid, thou smellest all of kitchen-grease. 
And look who comes behind,' for there was Kay. 
' Knowest thou not me ? thy master ? I am Kay. 735 
We lack thee by the hearth.' 

And Gareth to him, 
* Master no more ! too well I know thee, ay — 
The most ungentle knight in Arthur's hall.' 
' Have at thee then,' said Kay: they shock'd ^ and Kay 
Fell shoulder-slipt,^ and Gareth cried again, 740 

'Lead, and I follow,' and fast away she fled. 

1 Only a few. ^ Toad-stool. 3 Woods. 

^ Rushed against each other. ^ Shoulder out of joint. 



Gareth and Lynette 71 

But after sod and shingle ^ ceased to fly 
Behind her, and the heart of her good horse 
Was nigh to burst with violence of the beat, 
Perforce she stay'd, and overtaken spoke. 745 



What doest thou, scullion, in my fellowship 



Deem'st thou that I accept thee aught the more 

Or love thee better, that by some device 

Full cowardly, or by mere unhappiness, 

Thou has overthrown and slain thy master — thou ! — 

Dish-washer and broach-turner, loon ! ^ — to me 751 

Thou smellest all of kitchen as before.' 

* Damsel,' Sir Gareth answer'd gently, ' say 
Whate'er ye will, but whatsoe'er ye say, 
I leave not till I finish this fair quest, 755 

Or die therefore.' 

' Ay, wilt thou finish it ? 
Sweet lord, how like a noble knight he talks ! 
The listening rogue hath caught the manner of it. 
But, knave, anon thou shalt be met with, knave, 
And then by such a one that thou for all 760 

The kitchen brewis that was ever supt 
Shalt not once dare to look him in the face.' 

' I shall assay,' ^ said Gareth with a smile 
That madden'd her, and away she flash'd again 
Down the long avenues of a boundless wood, 765 

And Gareth following was again beknaved. 

1 Coarse gravel. 2 Stupid person. 3 Xry. 



y2 Idylls of the King 

* Sir Kitchen-knave, I have miss'd the only way 
Where Arthur's men are set along the wood ; 
The wood is nigh as full of thieves as leaves : 
If both be slain, I am rid of thee ; but yet, 770 

Sir Scullion, canst thou use that spit of thine? 
Fight, an thou canst: I have miss'd the only way.' 

So till the dusk that foUow'd even-song^ 
Rode on the two, reviler and reviled ; 
Then after one long slope was mounted, saw, 775 

Bowl-shaped, thro' tops of many thousand pines 
A gloomy-gladed hollow slowly sink 
To westward — in the deeps whereof a mere,^ 
Round as the red eye of an Eagle-owl,^ 
Under the half-dead sunset glared ; and shouts 780 

Ascended, and there brake a serving man 
Flying from out of the black wood, and crying, 
' They have bound my lord to cast him in the mere.' 
Then Gareth, ' Bound am I to right the wrong'd, 
But straitlier bound am I to bide with thee.' 785 

And when the damsel spake contemptuously, 
' Lead, and I follow,' Gareth cried again, 
' Follow, I lead ! ' so down among the pines 
He plunged ; and there, blackshadow'd nigh the mere. 
And mid-thigh-deep in bulrushes and reed, 790 

Saw six tall men haling a seventh along, 
A stone about his neck to drown him in it. 

1 The time for evening service. '^ Pond or lake. 

3 Great horned owl, Btdo maximus. 



Gareth and Lynette 73 

Three with good blows he quieted, but three, 
Fled thro' the pines ; and Gareth loosed the stone 
From off his neck, then in the mere beside 795 

Tumbled it ; oilily bubbled up the mere. 
Last, Gareth loosed his bonds and on free feet 
Set him, a stalwart Baron, Arthur's friend. 

' Well that ye came, or else these caitiff^ rogues 
Had wreak'd themselves on me ; good cause is theirs 
To hate me, for my wont ^ hath ever been 801 

To catch my thief, and then like vermin here 
Drown him, and with a stone about his neck ; 
And under this wan water many of them 
Lie rotting, but at night let go the stone, 805 

And rise, and flickering in a grimly^ light 
Dance on the mere. Good now, ye have saved a life 
Worth somewhat as the cleanser of this wood. 
And fain would I reward thee worshipfully. 
W^hat guerdon ^ will ye ? ' 

Gareth sharply spake, 810 
' None ! for the deed's sake have I done the deed, 
In uttermost obedience to the King. 
But wilt thou yield this damsel harbourage ? ' ^ 

Whereat the Baron saying, ' I well believe 
You be of Arthur's Table,' a light laugh 815 

Broke from Lynette, ' Ay, truly of a truth, 

1 Cowardly and wicked. 2 Custom. 

3 Hideous. * Reward. ^ Shelter. 



74 Idylls of the King 

And in a sort, being Arthur's kitchen-knave ! — 

But deem not I accept thee aught the more, 

SculHon, for running sharply with thy spit 

Down on a rout of craven foresters. 820 

A thresher with his flail had scatter'd them. 

Nay — for thou smellest of the kitchen still. 

But an this lord will yield us harbourage, well.' 

So she spake. A league beyond the wood. 
All in a full-fair manor ^ and a rich, 825 

His towers where that day a feast had been 
Held in high hall, and many a viand - left, 
And many a costly cate,^ received the three. 
And there they placed a peacock in his pride 
Before the damsel, and the Baron set 830 

Gareth beside her, but at once she rose. 

' Meseems, that here is much discourtesy. 
Setting this knave. Lord Baron, at my side. 
Hear me — this morn I stood in Arthur's hall, 
And pray'd the King would grant me Lancelot 835 

To fight the brotherhood of Day and Night — 
The last a monster unsubduable 
Of any save of him for whom I call'd — 
Suddenly bawls this frontless ^ kitchen-knave, 
" The quest is mine ; thy kitchen-knave am I, 840 

i Landed estate of a noble. ^ Provision, especially meat. 
3 Delicate food. * Bold, shameless. 



Gareth and Lynette 75 

And mighty thro' thy meats and drinks am I." 

Then Arthur all at once gone mad replies, 

" Go therefore," and so gives the quest to him — 

Him — here — a villain fitter to stick swine 

Than ride abroad redressing woman's wrong, 845 

Or sit beside a noble gentlewoman.' 

Then half-ashamed and part-amazed, the lord 
Now look'd at one and now at other, left 
The damsel by the peacock in his pride, 
And, seating Gareth at another board, 850 

Sat down beside him, ate and then began. 

' Friend, whether thou be kitchen-knave, or not, 
Or whether it be the maiden's fantasy. 
And whether she be mad, or else the King, 
Or both or neither, or thyself be mad, 855 

I ask not : but thou strikest a strong stroke, 
For strong thou art and goodly therewithal. 
And saver of my life ; and therefore now, 
For here be mighty men to joust with, weigh 
Whether thou wilt not with thy damsel back 860 

To crave again Sir Lancelot of the King. 
Thy pardon ; I but speak for thine avail, 
The saver of my lifei' 

And Gareth said, 
' Full pardon, but I follow up the quest, 
Despite of Day and Night and Death and Hell.' 865 



76 Idylls of the King 

So when, next morn, the lord whose life he saved 
Had, some brief space, convey'd them on their way 
And left them with God-speed, Sir Gareth spake, 
'Lead, and I follow.' Haughtily she replied, 

* I fly no more : I allow thee for an hour. 870 

Lion and stoat ^ have isled together, knave. 
In time of flood. Nay, furthermore, methinks 
Some ruth^ is mine for thee. Back wilt thou, fool ? 
For hard by here is one will overthrow 
And slay thee : then will I to court again, 875 

And shame the King for only yielding me 
My champion from the ashes of his hearth.' 

To whom Sir Gareth answer'd courteously, 
* Say thou thy say, and I will do my deed. 
Allow me for mine hour, and thou wilt find 880 

My fortunes all as fair as hers who lay 
Among the ashes and wedded the King's son. 



' 3 



Then to the shore of one of those long loops 
Wherethro' the serpent river coil'd, they came. 
Rough-thicketed were the banks and steep ; the stream 
Full, narrow ; this a bridge of single arc 886 

Took at a leap ; and on the further side 
Arose a silk pavilion, gay with gold 
In streaks and rays, and all Lent-lily ^ in hue. 
Save that the dome was purple, and above, 890 

1 Ermine. 2 pjty. SQnderella. * daffodil. 



Gareth and Lynette 77 

Crimson, a slender banneret ^ fluttering. 

And therebefore the lawless warrior paced 

Unarm'd, and calling, ' Damsel, is this he, 

The champion thou hast brought from Arthur's hall ? 

For whom we let thee pass.' ' Nay, nay,' she said, 895 

' Sir Morning-Star. The King in utter scorn 

Of thee and thy much folly hath sent thee here 

His kitchen-knave : and look thou to thyself : 

See that he fall not on thee suddenly. 

And slay thee unarm'd : he is not knight but knave.' 900 

Then at his call, ' O daughters of the Dawn, 
And servants of the Morning-Star, approach. 
Arm me,' from out the silken curtain-folds 
Bare-footed and bare-headed three fair girls 
In gilt and rosy raiment came : their feet 905 

In dewy grasses glisten'd ; and the hair 
All over glanced with dewdrop or with gem 
Like sparkles in the stone Avanturine.- 
These arm'd Rim in blue arms, and gave a shield 
Blue also, and thereon the morning star. 910 

And Gareth silent gazed upon the knight. 
Who stood a moment, ere his horse was brought, 
Glorying ; and in the stream beneath him, shone 
Immingled with Heaven's azure waveringly, 
The gay pavilion and the naked feet, 915 

His arms, the rosy raiment, and the star. 

1 A small banner, borne by knights of a certain rank. 

2 Quartz with flakes of mica in it. 



yS Idylls of the King 

Then she that watch 'd him, ' Wherefore stare ye so ? 
Thou shakest in thy fear : there yet is time : 
Flee down the valley before he get to horse. 
Who will cry shame ? Thou art not knight but 
knave.' 920 

Said Gareth, ' Damsel, whether knave or knight, 
Far liefer had I fight a score of times 
Then hear thee so missay me and revile. 
Fair words were best for him w^ho fights for thee ; 
But truly foul are better, for they send 925 

That strength of anger thro' mine arms, I know 
That I shall overthrow him.' 

And he that bore 
The star, then mounted, cried from o'er the bridge, 
* A kitchen-knave, and sent in scorn of me ! 
Such fight not I, but answer scorn with scorn. 930 

For this were shame to do him further wrong 
Than set him on his feet, and take his hcft'se 
And arms, and so return him to the King. 
Come, therefore, leave thy lady lightly, knave. 
Avoid : ^ for it beseemeth not a knave 935 

To ride with such a lady.' 

' Dog, thou liest. 
I spring from loftier lineage than thine own.' 
He spake ; and all at fiery speed the two 
1 Go away, or dismount. 



Gareth and Lynette 79 

Shock'd on the central bridge, and either spear 

Bent but not brake, and either knight at once, 940 

Hurl'd as a stone from out of a catapult^ 

Beyond his horse's crupper and the bridge, 

Fell, as if dead ; but quickly rose and drew, 

And Gareth lash'd so fiercely with his brand 

He drave his enemy backward down the bridge, 945 

The damsel crying, 'Well-stricken, kitchen-knave ! ' 

Till Gareth 's shield was cloven ; but one stroke 

Laid him that clove it grovelling on the ground. 

Then cried the fall'n, ' Take not my life : I yield.' 
And Gareth, ' So this damsel ask it of me 950 

Good — I accord it easily as a grace.' 
She reddening, ' Insolent scullion : I of thee ? 
I bound to thee for any favour ask'd ! ' 
' Then shall he die.' And Gareth there unlaced 
His helmet as to slay him, but she shriek'd, 955 

' Be not so hardy, scullion, as to slay 
One nobler than thyself.' ' Damsel, thy charge 
Is an abounding pleasure to me. Knight, 
Thy life is thine at her command. Arise 
And quickly pass to Arthur's hall, and say 960 

His kitchen-knave hath sent thee. See thou crave 
His pardon for thy breaking of his laws. 
Myself, when I return, will plead for thee. 
Thy shield is mine — farewell ; and, damsel, thou, 
Lead, and I follow.' 

1 Ancient engine of war, used for throwing stones. 



8o Idylls of the King 

And fast away she fled. 965 

Then when he came upon her, spake, ' Methought, 
Knave, when I watch'd thee striking on the bridge 
The savour of thy kitchen came upon me 
A little faintlier : but the wind hath changed : 
I scent it twenty-fold.' And then she sang, 970 

' " O morning star " (not that tall felon there 
Whom thou by sorcery or unhappiness ^ 
Or some device, hast foully- overthrown), 
" O morning star that smilest in the blue, 
O star, my morning dream hath proven true, 975 

Smile sweetly, thou ! my love hath smiled on me." 

* But thou begone, take counsel, and away, 
For hard by here is one that guards a ford — 
The second brother in their fool's parable — 
Will pay thee all thy wages, and to boot. 9S0 

Care not for shame : thou art not knight but knave.' 

To whom Sir Gareth answer 'd laughingly, 
* Parables ? Hear a parable of the knave. 
When I was kitchen-knave among the rest 
Fierce was the hearth, and one of my co-mates 985 

Own'd a rough dog, to whom he cast his coat, 
*' Guard it," and there was none to meddle with it. 
And such a coat art thou, and thee the King 
Gave me to guard, and such a dog am I, 
To worry, and not to flee — and — knight or knave — 990 
The knave that doth thee service as full knight 
1 Mishap. 2 Unfairly. 



Gareth and Lynette 8i 

Is all as good, meseems, as any knight 
Toward thy sister's freeing.' 

' Ay, Sir Knave ! 
Ay, knave, because thou strikest as a knight, 
Being but knave, I hate thee all the more.' 995 

* Fair damsel, you should worship^ me the more, 
That, being but knave, I throw thine enemies.' 

' Ay, ay,' she said, ' but thou shalt meet thy match.' 

So when they touch 'd the second river-loop, 
Huge on a huge red horse, and all in mail 1000 

Burnish'd to blinding, shone the Noonday Sun 
Beyond a raging shallow. As if the flower,^ 
That blows a globe of after arrowlets. 
Ten thousand-fold had grown, flash'd the fierce shield, 
All sun ; and Gareth's eyes had flying blots 1005 

Before them when he turn'd from watching him. 
He from beyond the roaring shallow roar'd, 
' What doest thou, brother, in my marches ^ here ? ' 
And she athwart the shallow thrill'd again, 
' Here is a kitchen-knave from Arthur's hall loio 

Hath overthrown thy brother, and hath his arms.' 
' Ugh ! ' cried the Sun, and vizoring'* up a red 
And cipher face of rounded foolishness, 

1 Honour. ^ Dandelion. ^ Boundaries of land. 

* Closing the front part of the helmet. 
IDYLLS OF THE KING — 6 



82 Idylls of the King 

Push'd horse across the foamings of the ford, 
Whom Gareth met midstream : no room was there 1015 
For lance or tourney-skill : four strokes they struck 
With sword, and these were mighty ; the new knight 
Had fear he might be shamed ; but as the Sun 
Heaved up a ponderous arm to strike the fifth, 
The hoof of his horse slipt in the stream, the stream 1020 
Descended, and the Sun was wash'd away. 

Then Gareth laid his lance athwart the ford ; 
So drew him home ; but he that fought no more, 
As being all bone-batter'd on the rock. 
Yielded ; and Gareth sent him to the King. 1025 

' Myself when I return wall plead for thee.' 
' Lead, and I follow.' Quietly she led. 
' Hath not the good wind, damsel, changed again ? ' 
' Nay, not a point : nor art thou victor here. 
There lies a ridge of slate across the ford ; 1030 

His horse thereon stumbled — ay, for I saw it. 

' " O Sun " (not this strong fool whom thou, Sir Knave, 
Hast overthrown thro' mere unhappiness), 
" O Sun, that wakenest all to bliss or pain, 
O moon, that layest all to sleep again, 1035 

Shine sweetly: twice my love hath smiled on me." 

' What knowest thou of lovesong or of love ? 
Nay, nay, God wot, so thou wert nobly born, 
Thou hast a pleasant presence. Yea, perchance, — 



Gareth and Lynette 83 

' *' O dewy flowers that open to the sun, 1040 

O dewy flowers that close when day is done, 
Blow sweetly : twice my love hath smiled on me." 

'What knowest thou of flowers, except, belike. 
To garnish meats with ? hath not our good King 
Who lent me thee, the flower of kitchendom, 1045 

A foolish love for flowers ? what stick ye round 
The pasty ? wherewithal deck the boar's head ? 
Flowers ? nay, the boar hath rosemaries and bay. 



' " O birds, that warble to the morning sky, 
O birds that warble as the day goes by. 
Sing sweetly: twice my love hath smiled on me." 



1050 



' What knowest thou of birds, lark, mavis, ^ merle, ^ 
Linnet ? what dream ye when they utter forth 
May-music growing with the growing light. 
Their sweet sun-worship ? these be for the snare 1055 
(So runs thy fancy), these be for the spit, 
Larding and basting. See thou have not now 
Larded thy last, except thou turn and fly. 
There stands the third fool of their allegory.' 

For there beyond a bridge of treble bow, 1060 

All in a rose-red from the west, and all 
Naked it seem'd, and glowing in the broad 
Deep-dimpled current underneath, the knight, 
That named himself the Star of Evening, stood. 

1 Song-thrush. ^ Blackbird. 



84 Idylls of the King 

And Gareth, ' Wherefore waits the madman there 1065 
Naked in open dayshine ? ' ' Nay,' she cried, 
* Not naked, only wrapt in harden'd skins 
That fit him Hke his own ; and so ye cleave 
His armour off him, these will turn the blade.' 

Then the third brother shouted o'er the bridge, 1070 
' O brother-star, why shine ye here so low ? 
Thy ward is higher up : but have ye slain 
The damsel's champion ? ' and the damsel cried, 

* No star of thine, but shot from Arthur's heaven 
With all disaster unto thine and thee ! 1075 

For both thy younger brethren have gone down 
Before this youth ; and so wilt thou, Sir Star ; 
Art thou not old ? ' 

' Old, damsel, old and hard. 
Old, with the might and breath of twenty boys.' 
Saith Gareth, ' Old, and over-bold in brag ! 1080 

But that same strength which threw the Morning Star 
Can throw the Evening.' 

Then that other blew 
A hard and deadly note upon the horn. 
' Approach and arm me ! ' With slow steps from out 
An old storm-beaten, russet, many-stain'd 1085 

Pavilion, forth a grizzled damsel came. 
And arm'd him in old arms, and brought a helm 
With but a drying evergreen for crest, 



Gareth and Lynette 85 

And gave a shield whereon the Star of Even 
Half-tarnish 'd and half-bright, his emblem, shone. 1090 
But when it glitter'd o'er the saddle-bow, 
They madly hurl'd together on the bridge ; 
And Gareth overthrew him, lighted, drew, 
There met him drawn, and overthrew him again ; 
But up like fire he started : and as oft 1095 

As Gareth brought him grovelling on his knees. 
So many a time he vaulted up again ; 
Till Gareth panted hard, and his great heart, 
Foredooming all his trouble was in vain, 
Laboured within him, for he seem'd as one uoo 

That all in later, sadder age begins 
To war against ill uses of a life. 
But these from all his life arise, and cry, 
' Thou hast made us lords, and canst not put us down ! ' 
He half despairs ; so Gareth seem'd to strike 1105 

Vainly, the damsel clamouring all the while, 
' Well done, knave-knight, well stricken, O good knight- 
knave — 
O knave, as noble as any of all the knights — 
Shame me not, shame me not. I have prophesied — 
Strike, thou art worthy of the Table Round — mo 

His arms are old, he trusts the harden'd skin — 
Strike — strike — the wind will never change again.' 
And Gareth hearing ever stronglier smote. 
And hew'd great pieces of his armour off him, 
But lash'd in vain against the harden'd skin, 1115 

And could not wholly bring him under, more 



86 Idylls of the King 

Than loud Southwesterns, rolling ridge on ridge, 

The buoy that rides at sea, and dips and springs 

For ever ; till at length Sir Gareth's brand 

Clash'd his, and brake it utterly to the hilt. 1120 

' I have thee now ; ' but forth that other sprang. 

And, all unknightlike, writhed his wiry arms 

Around him, till he felt, despite his mail. 

Strangled, but straining ev'n his uttermost 

Cast, and so hurl'd him headlong o'er the bridge 1125 

Down to the river, sink or swim, and cried, 

'Lead, and I follow.' 

But the damsel said, 
' I lead no longer ; ride thou at my side ; 
Thou art the kingliest of all kitchen-knaves. 

' " O trefoil,^ sparkling on the rainy plain, 1130 

O rainbow with three colours after rain, 
Shine sweetly : thrice my love hath smiled on me." 

* Sir, — and, good faith, I fain had added — Knight, 
But that I heard thee call thyself a knave, — 
Shamed am I that I so rebuked, reviled, 1135 

Missaid thee ; noble I am ; and thought the King 
Scorn'd me and mine ; and now thy pardon, friend, 
For thou hast ever answer'd courteously. 
And wholly bold thou art, and meek withal 
As any of Arthur's best, but, being knave, 1140 

Hast mazed my wit : I marvel what thou art.' 

1 Three-leaved clover. 



Gareth and Lynette 87 

* Damsel,' he said, ' you be not all to blame. 
Saving that you mistrusted our good King 
Would handle scorn, or yield you, asking, one 
Not fit to cope ^ your quest. You said your say ; 1145 
Mine answer was my deed. Good sooth ! I hold 
He scarce is knight, yea but half-man, nor meet 
To fight for gentle damsel, he, who lets 
His heart be stirr'd with any foolish heat 
At any gentle damsel's waywardness. 1150 

Shamed ! care not ! thy foul sayings fought for me : 
And seeing now thy words are fair, methinks 
There rides no knight, not Lancelot, his great self, 
Hath force to quell me.' 

Nigh upon that hour 
When the lone hern^ forgets his melancholy, 1155 

Lets down his other leg, and stretching, dreams 
Of goodly supper in the distant pool, 
Then turn'd the noble damsel smiUng at him, 
And told him of a cavern hard at hand. 
Where bread and baken meats and good red wine 1160 
Of Southland, which the Lady Lyonors 
Had sent her coming champion, waited him. 

Anon they past a narrow comb ^ wherein 
Were slabs of rock with figures, knights on horse 
Sculptured, and deckt in slowly-waning hues. 1165 

' Sir Knave, my knight, a hermit once was here, 

1 Meet on equal terms. ^ Heron. 

^ Valley in a hill-side. 



88 Idylls of the King 

Whose holy hand hath fashion'd on the rock 

The war of Time against the soul of man. 

And yon four fools have suck'd their allegory 

From these damp walls, and taken but the form. 1170 

Know ye not these ? ' and Gareth lookt and read — 

In letters like to those the vexillary ^ 

Hath left crag-carven o'er the streaming Gelt- — 

' Phosphorus,' then * Meridies ' — ' Hesperus ' — 

' Nox ' — ' Mors,' beneath five figures, armed men, 1175 

Slab after slab, their faces forward all. 

And running down the Soul, a Shape that fled 

With broken wings, torn raiment and loose hair, 

For help and shelter to the hermit's cave. 

' Follow the faces, and we find it. Look, nSo 

Who comes behind ! ' 

For one — delay'd at first 
Thro' helping back the dislocated Kay 
To Camelot, then by what thereafter chanced, 
The damsel's headlong error ^ thro' the wood — 
Sir Lancelot, having swum the river-loops — 1185 

His blue shield-lions cover'd — softly drew 
Behind the twain, and when he saw the star 
Gleam, on Sir Gareth's turning to him, cried, 
' Stay, felon '^ knight, I avenge me for my friend.' 
And Gareth crying prick'd against the cry : 1190 

1 Roman standard-bearer of a legion. 

2 A small river in Cumberland. 

3 Wandering. * Treacherous. 



Gareth and Lynette 89 

But when they closed — in a moment — at one touch 
Of that skill'd spear, the wonder of the world — 
Went sliding down so easily, and fell, 
That when he found the grass within his hands 
He laugh'd; the laughter jarr'd upon Lynette: 1195 

Harshly she ask'd him, ' Shamed and overthrown, 
And tumbled back into the kitchen-knave, 
Why laugh ye ? that ye blew your boast in vain ? ' 
* Nay, noble damsel, but that I, the son 
Of old King Lot and good Queen Bellicent, 1200 

And victor of the bridges and the ford, 
And knight of Arthur, here lie thrown by whom 
I know not, all thro' mere unhappiness — 
Device and sorcery and unhappiness — 
Out, sword ; we are thrown ! ' And Lancelot answer'd 
' Prince, 1205 

O Gareth — thro' the mere unhappiness 
Of one who came to help thee, not to harm, 
Lancelot, and all as glad to find thee whole, 
As on the day when Arthur knighted him.' 1209 

Then Gareth, ' Thou — Lancelot! — thine the hand 
That threw me ? And some chance to mar the boast 
Thy brethren of thee make — which could not chance — 
Had sent thee down before a lesser spear, 
Shamed had I been, and sad — O Lancelot — thou ! ' 

Whereat the maiden, petulant, ' Lancelot, 1215 

Why came ye not, when call'd ? and wherefore now 



90 Idylls of the King 

Come ye, not call'd ? I gloried in my knave, 

Who being still rebuked, would answer still 

Courteous as any knight — but now, if knight. 

The marvel dies, and leaves me fool'd and tricked, 1220 

And only wondering wherefore play'd upon : 

And doubtful whether I and mine be scorn'd. 

Where should be truth if not in Arthur's hall, 

In Arthur's presence ? Knight, knave, prince and fool, 

I hate thee and for ever.' 

And Lancelot said, 1225 

' Blessed be thou. Sir Gareth ! knight art thou 
To the King's best wish. O damsel, be you wise 
To call him shamed, who is but overthrown ? 
Thrown have I been, nor once, but many a time. 
Victor from vanquish'd issues at the last, 1230 

And overthrower from being overthrown. 
With sword we have not striven ; and thy good horse 
And thou are weary ; yet not less I felt 
Thy manhood thro' that wearied lance of thine. 
Well hast thou done ; for all the stream is freed, 1235 
And thou hast wreak'd his justice on his foes. 
And when reviled, hast answer'd graciously, 
And makest merry when overthrow^n. Prince, Knight, 
Hail, Knight and Prince, and of our Table Round ! ' 

And then when turning to Lynette he told 1240 

The tale of Gareth, petulantly she said, 
' Ay well — ay well — for worse than being fool'd 
Of others, is to fool one's self. A cave, 



Gareth and Lynette 91 

Sir Lancelot, is hard by, with meats and drinks 

And forage for the horse, and flint for fire. 1245 

But all about it flies a honeysuckle. 

Seek, till we find.' And when they sought and found, 

Sir Gareth drank and ate, and all his life 

Past into sleep ; on whom the maiden gazed. 

' Sound sleep be thine ! sound cause to sleep hast thou. 

Wake lusty! Seem I not as tender to him 1251 

As any mother ? Ay, but such a one 

As all day long hath rated at her child, 

And vext his day, but blesses him asleep — 

Good lord, how sweetly smells the honeysuckle 1255 

In the hush'd night, as if the world were one 

Of utter peace, and love, and gentleness ! 

O Lancelot, Lancelot ' — and she clapt her hands — 

' Full merry am I to find my goodly knave 

Is knight and noble. See now, sworn have I, 1260 

Else yon black felon had not let me pass, 

To bring thee back to do the battle with him. 

Thus an thou goest, he will fight thee first ; 

Who doubts thee victor ? so will my knight-knave 

Miss the full flower of this accomplishment.' 1265 

Said Lancelot, ' Peradventure he, you name, 
May know my shield. Let Gareth, an he will, 
Change his for mine, and take my charger, fresh, 
Not to be spurr'd, loving the battle as well 
As he that rides him.' ' Lancelot-like,' she said, 1270 
' Courteous in this, Lord Lancelot, as in all.' 



92 Idylls of the King 

And Gareth, wakening, fiercely clutch 'd the shield ; 
' Ramp ^ ye lance-splintering lions, on whom all spears 
Are rotten sticks ! ye seem agape to roar ! 
Yea, ramp and roar at leaving of your lord ! — 1275 

Care not, good beasts, so well I care for you. 

noble Lancelot, from my hold on these 

Streams virtue — fire — thro' one that will not shame 
Even the shadow of Lancelot under shield. 
Hence : let us go.' 

Silent the silent field 1280 

They traversed. Arthur's harp- tho' summer-wan, 
In counter motion to the clouds, allured 
The glance of Gareth dreaming on his liege. 
A star shot : ' Lo,' said Gareth, ' the foe falls ! ' 
An owl whoopt : ' Hark the victor pealing there ! ' 1285 
Suddenly she that rode upon his left 
Clung to the shield that Lancelot lent him, crying, 
* Yield, yield him this again ; 'tis he must fight : 

1 curse the tongue that all thro' yesterday 

Reviled thee, and hath wrought on Lancelot now 1290 
To lend thee horse and shield : wonders ye have done ; 
Miracles ye cannot : here is glory enow 
In having flung the three : I see thee maim'd. 
Mangled : I swear thou canst not fling the fourth.' 

' And wherefore, damsel ? tell me all ye know. 1295 
You cannot scare me ; nor rough face, or voice, 

1 Rear, stand on hind legs. ~ A constellation. 



Gareth and Lynette 93 

Brute bulk of limb, or boundless savagery 
Appall me from the quest.' 

' Nay, Prince,' she cried, 
' God wot, I never look'd upon the face, 
Seeing he never rides abroad by day ; 1300 

But watch 'd him have I like a phantom pass 
Chilling the night : nor have I heard the voice. 
Always he made his mouthpiece of a page 
Who came and went, and still reported him 
As closing in himself the strength of ten, 1305 

And when his anger tare him, massacring 
Man, woman, lad and girl — yea, the soft babe ! 
Some hold that he hath swallow'd infant flesh, 
Monster ! O Prince, I went for Lancelot first, 
The quest is Lancelot's : give him back the shield.' 1310 

Said Gareth laughing, ' An he fight for this, 
Belike he wins it as the better man : 
Thus — and not else ! ' 

But Lancelot on him urged 
All the devisings ^ of their chivalry 
When one might meet a mightier than himself ; 1315 

How best to manage horse, lance, sword and shield, 
And so fill up the gap where force might fail 
With skill and fineness. Instant^ were his words. 

Then Gareth, ' Here be rules. I know but one — 

To dash against mine enemy and to win. 1320 

1 Rules and tactics. ^ Pressing. 



( 



94 Idylls of the King 

Yet have I watch 'd thee victor in the joust, 

And seen thy way.' ' Heaven help thee,' sigh'd Lynette. 

Then for a space, and under cloud that grew 
To thunder-gloom palling ^ all stars, they rode 
In converse till she made her palfrey halt, 1325 

Lifted an arm, and softly whisper'd, ' There.' 
And all the three were silent seeing, pitch'd 
Beside the Castle Perilous on fiat field, 
A huge pavilion like a mountain peak 
Sunder the glooming crimson on the marge, 1330 

Black, with black banner, and a long black horn 
Beside it hanging ; which Sir Gareth graspt, 
And so, before the two could hinder him, 
Sent all his heart and breath thro' all the horn. 
Echo'd the walls ; a light twinkled ; anon 1335 

Came lights and lights, and once again he blew ; j 
Whereon were hollow tramplings up and down ^ 
And muffled voices heard, and shadows past ; 
Till high above him, circled with her maids. 
The Lady Lyonors at a window stood, 1340 

Beautiful among lights, and waving to him 
White hands, and courtesy ; but when the Prince 
Three times had blown — after long hush — at last — 
The huge pavilion slowly yielded up. 
Thro' those black foldings, that which housed 

therein. 1345 

High on a nightblack horse, in nightblack arms, 

1 Covering as with a pall. 



Gareth and Lynette 95 

With white breast-bone, and barren ribs of Death, 
And crown'd with fleshless laughter^ — some ten steps — 
In the half-light — thro' the dim dawn — advanced 
The monster, and then paused, and spake no word. 1350 

But Gareth spake and all indignantly, 
' Fool, for thou hast, men say, the strength of ten, 
Canst thou not trust the limbs thy God hath given, 
But must, to make the terror of thee more, 
Trick thyself out in ghastly imageries 1355 

Of that which Life hath done with, and the clod, 
Less dull than thou, will hide with mantling flowers 
As if for pity ? ' But he spake no word ; 
Which set the horror higher : a maiden swoon'd ; 
The Lady Lyonors wrung her hands and wept, 1360 

As doom'd to be the bride of Night and Death ; 
Sir Gareth 's head prickled beneath his helm ; 
And ev'n Sir Lancelot thro' his warm blood felt 
Ice strike, and all that mark'd him were aghast. 

At once Sir Lancelot's charger fiercely neigh'd, 1365 
And Death's dark war-horse bounded forward with him. 
Then those that did not blink ^ the terror, saw 
That Death was cast to ground, and slowly rose. 
But with one stroke Sir Gareth split the skull. 
Half fell to right and half to left and lay. 1370 

Then with a stronger buffet he clove the helm 
As throughly as the skull ; and out from this 

^ A grinning skull above the helmet. ^ shut their eyes to. 



g6 Idylls of the King 

Issued the bright face of a blooming boy 

Fresh as a flower new-born, and crying, ' Knight, 

Slay me not : my three brethren bade me do it, 1375 

To make a horror all about the house. 

And stay the world from Lady Lyonors. 

They never dream'd the passes would be past.' 

Answer'd Sir Gareth graciously to one 

Not many a moon ^ his younger, ' My fair child, 1380 

What madness made thee challenge the chief knight 

Of Arthur's hall ? ' ' Fair Sir, they bade me do it. 

They hate the King, and Lancelot, the King's 

friend. 
They hoped to slay him somewhere on the stream. 
They never dream'd the passes could be past.' 13S5 

Then sprang the happier day from underground ; 
And Lady Lyonors and her house, with dance 
And revel and song, made merry over Death, 
As being after all their foolish fears 
And horrors only proven a blooming boy. 1390 

So large mirth lived and Gareth won the quest. 

And he " that told the tale in older times 
Says that Sir Gareth wedded Lyonors, 
But he," that told it later, says Lynette. 

1 Month. 2 Malory. ^ Tennyson. 



LANCELOT AND ELAINE 

Elaine the fair, Elaine the lovable, 

Elaine, the lily maid of Astolat, 

High in her chamber up a tower to the east 

Guarded the sacred shield of Lancelot ; 

Which first she placed where morning's earliest ray 

Might strike it, and awake her wdth the gleam ; 

Then fearing rust or soilure fashion 'd for it 

A case of silk, and braided thereupon 

All the devices ^ blazon 'd on the shield 

In their own tinct,- and added, of her wit," 

A border fantasy of branch and flower, 

And yellows-throated nestling in the nest. 

Nor rested thus content, but day by day. 

Leaving her household and good father, climb'd 

That eastern tower, and entering barr'd her door, 

Stript off the case, and read the naked shield. 

Now guess'd a hidden meaning in his arms. 

Now made a pretty history to herself 

Of every dint a sword had beaten in it. 

And every scratch a lance had made upon it. 

Conjecturing when and where : this cut is fresh ; 

That ten years back ; this dealt him at Caerlyle ; 

1 Emblems. ^ Colour. 3 Fancy. 

IDYLLS OF THE KING — 7 97 



98 Idylls of the King 

That at Caerleon ; this at Camelot : 

And ah God's mercy, what a stroke was there ! 

And here a thrust that might have kill'd, but God 25 

Broke the strong lance, and roll'd his enemy down. 

And saved him : so she Hved in fantasy. 

How came the lily maid by that good shield 
Of Lancelot, she that knew not ev'n his name ? 
He left it with her, when he rode to tilt 30 

For the great diamond in the diamond jousts. 
Which Arthur had ordain'd, and by that name 
Had named them, since a diamond w^as the prize. 

For Arthur, long before they crown 'd him King, 
Roving the trackless realms of Lyonesse, 35 

Had found a glen, gray boulder and black tarn. 
A horror lived about the tarn, and clave 
Like its own mists to all the mountain side : 
For here two brothers, one a king, had met 
And fought together ; but their names were lost ; 40 
And each had slain his brother at a blow^ ; 
And down they fell and made the glen abhorr'd : 
And there they lay till all their bones were bleach'd. 
And lichen 'd^ into colour with the crags : 
And he, that once was king, had on a crown 45 

Of diamonds, one in front, and four aside.^ 
And Arthur came, and labouring up the pass, 
All in a misty moonshine, unawares 

1 Covered with lichens. 2 Qn each side. 



Lancelot and Elaine 



99 



Had trodden that crown'd skeleton, and the skull 

Brake from the nape,^ and from the skull the crown 50 

Roll'd into Hght, and turning on its rims 

Fled like a glittering rivulet to the tarn : 

And down the shingly scaur ^ he plunged, and caught, 

And set it on his head, and in his heart 

Heard murmurs, ' Lo, thou likewise shalt be King.' 55 

Thereafter, when a King, he had the gems 
Pluck'd from the crown, and show'd them to his knights, 
Saying, ' These jewels, whereupon I chanced 
Divinely,^ are the kingdom's, not the King's — 
For public use : henceforward let there be, 60 

Once every year, a joust for one of these : 
For so by nine years' proof w^e needs must learn 
Which is our mightiest, and ourselves shall grow 
In use of arms and manhood, till we drive 
The heathen, who, some say, shall rule the land 65 

Hereafter, which God hinder.' Thus he spoke : 
And eight years past, eight jousts had been, and still 
Had Lancelot won the diamond of the year. 
With purpose to present them to the Queen, 
When all were won ; but meaning all at once 70 

To snare her royal fancy with a boon 
Worth half her realm, had never spoken word. 

Now for the central diamond and the last 
And largest, Arthu holding then his court 

1 Top of the neck. 2 Steep cliff. ^ gy Divine guidance. 



loo Idylls of the King 

Hard on the river nigh the place which now 75 

Is this world's hugest/ let proclaim a joust 
At Camelot, and when the time drew nigh 
Spake (for she had been sick) to Guinevere, 
' Are you so sick, my Queen, you cannot move 
To these fair jousts?' 'Yea, lord,' she said, 'ye 
know it.' 80 

' Then will ye miss,' he answer 'd, ' the great deeds 
Of Lancelot, and his prowess in the lists, 
A sight ye love to look on.' And the Queen 
Lifted her eyes, and they dwelt languidly 
On Lancelot, where he stood beside the King. 85 

He thinking that he read her meaning there, 
' Stay with me, I am sick ; my love is more 
Than many diamonds,' yielded ; and a heart 
Love-loyal to the least wish of the Queen 
(However much he yearn 'd to make complete 90 

The tale ^ of diamonds for his destined boon) 
Urged him to speak against the truth, and say, 
' Sir King, mine ancient wound is hardly w^iole, 
And lets ^ me from the saddle ; ' and the King 
Glanced first at him, then her, and went his way. 95 
No sooner gone than suddenly she began : 

' To blame, my lord Sir Lancelot, much to blame ! 
Why go ye not to these fair jousts ? the knights 
Are half of them our enemies, and the crowd 
Will murmur, " Lo, the shameless ones, who take 100 
1 London. 2 YnW number. 3 Hinders. 



Lancelot and Elaine loi 

Their pastime now the trustful King is gone ! " ' 

Then Lancelot vext at having lied in vain : 

' Are ye so wise ? ye were not once so wise, 

My Queen, that summer, when ye loved me first. 

Then of the crowd ye took no more account 105 

Than of the myriad cricket of the mead. 

When its own voice clings to each blade of grass, 

And every voice is nothing. As to knights, 

Them surely can I silence with all ease. 

But now my loyal worship is allow'd no 

Of all men : many a bard, without offence, 

Has link'd our names together in his lay. 

Lancelot, the flower of bravery, Guinevere, 

The pearl of beauty : and our knights at feast 

Have pledged us in this union, while the King 115 

Would listen smiling. How then ? is there more ? 

Has Arthur spoken aught ? or would yourself. 

Now weary of my service and devoir,^ 

Henceforth be truer to your faultless lord ? ' 

She broke into a little scornful laugh : 120 

' Arthur, my lord, Arthur, the faultless King, 
That passionate perfection, my good lord — 
But who can gaze upon the Sun in heaven ? 
He never spake word of reproach to me. 
He never had a glimpse of mine untruth, 125 

He cares not for me : only here to-day 
There gleam'd a vague suspicion in his eyes : 

1 Dutiful attentions. 



102 Idylls of the King 

Some meddling rogue has tamper'd with him — else 

Rapt in this fancy of his Table Round, 

And swearing men to vows impossible, 130 

To make them like himself : but, friend, to me 

He is all fault who hath no fault at all : 

For who loves me must have a touch of earth ; 

The low sun makes the colour : I am yours, 

Not Arthur's, as ye know, save by the bond. 135 

And therefore hear my words : go to the jousts : 

The tiny-trumpeting gnat can break our dream 

When sweetest ; and the vermin voices here 

May buzz so loud — we scorn them, but they sting.' 

Then answer'd Lancelot, the chief of knights : 140 
' And with what face, after my pretext made, 
Shall I appear, O Queen, at Camelot, I 
Before a King who honours his own word, 
As if it were his God's ? ' 

'Yea,' said the Queen, 
' A moral child without the craft to rule, 145 

Else had he not lost me : but listen to me, 
If I must find you wit : we hear it said 
That men go down before your spear at a touch. 
But knowing you are Lancelot ; your great name. 
This conquers : hide it therefore ; go unknown : 150 
Win ! by this kiss you will : and our true King 
Will then allow your pretext, O my knight. 
As all for glory ; for to speak him true. 



Lancelot and Elaine 103 

Ye know right well, how meek soe'er he seem, 

No keener hunter after glory breathes. 155 

He loves it in his knights more than himself : 

They prove to him his work: win and return.' 

Then got Sir Lancelot suddenly to horse. 
Wroth at himself. Not willing to be known. 
He left the barren-beaten thoroughfare, 160 

Chose the green path that show'd the rarer foot, 
And there among the solitary downs, ^ 
Full often lost in fancy, lost his way ; 
Till as he traced a faintly-shadow'd track. 
That all in loops and links among the dales 165 

Ran to the Castle of Astolat, he saw 
Fired from the west,^ far on a hill, the towers. 
Thither he made, and blew the gateway horn. 
Then came an old, dumb, myriad-wrinkled man, 
Who let him into lodging and disarm 'd. 170 

And Lancelot marvell'd at the wordless man ; 
And issuing found the Lord of Astolat 
With two strong sons. Sir Torre and Sir Lavaine, 
Moving to meet him in the castle court ; 
And close behind them stept the lily maid 175 

Elaine, his daughter : mother of the house 
There was not : some light jest among them rose 
With laughter dying down as the great knight 
Approach 'd them : then the Lord of Astolat : 

1 Broad, bare hills, used for pasture. 

2 Reflecting sunset in the windows. 



104 Idylls of the King 

' Whence comest thou, my guest, and by what name iSo 

Livest between the Hps ? for by thy state 

And presence I might guess thee chief of those. 

After the King, who eat in Arthur's halls. 

Him have I seen : the rest, his Table Round, 

Known as they are, to me they are unknown.' 1S5 

Then answer'd Lancelot, the chief of knights : 
' Known am I, and of Arthur's hall, and known. 
What I by mere mischance have brought, my shield. 
But since I go to joust as one unknown 
At Camelot for the diamond, ask me not, 190 

Hereafter ye shall know me — and the shield — 
I pray you lend me one, if such you have. 
Blank, or at least with some device not mine.' 

Then said the Lord of Astolat, ' Here is Torre's : 
Hurt in his first tilt was my son, Sir Torre. 195 

And so, God wot, his shield is blank enough. 
His ye can have.' Then added plain Sir Torre, 
' Yea, since I cannot use it, ye may have it.' 
Here laugh 'd the father saying, ' Fie, Sir Churl, 
Is that an answer for a noble knight ? 200 

Allow ^ him ! but Lavaine, my younger here. 
He is so full of lustihood,- he will ride, 
Joust for it, and win, and bring it in an hour, 
And set it in this damsel's golden hair, 
To make her thrice as wilful as before.' 205 

1 Pardon. ^ Vigour, courage. 



Lancelot and Elaine 105 

' Nay, father, nay, good father, shame me not 
Before this noble knight,' said young Lavaine, 
' For nothing. Surely I but play'd on Torre : 
He seemed so sullen, vext he could not go : 
A jest, no more ! for knight, the maiden dreamt 210 
That some one put this diamond in her hand, 
And that it was too slippery to be held. 
And slipt and fell into some pool or stream. 
The castle-well, belike ; and then I said 
That if I went, and if I fought and won it 215 

(But all was jest and joke among ourselves) 
Then must she keep it safelier. All was jest. 
But, father, give me leave, an if he will. 
To ride to Camelot with this noble knight ; 
Win shall I not, but do my best to win : 220 

Young as I am, yet would I do my best.' 

' So ye will grace ^ me,' answer'd Lancelot, 
Smiling a moment, ' with your fellowship 
O'er these waste downs whereon I lost myself. 
Then were I glad of you as guide and friend : 225 

And you shall win this diamond, — as I hear 
It is a fair large diamond, — if ye may. 
And yield it to this maiden, if ye will.' 
' A fair large diamond,' added plain Sir Torre, 
' Such be for queens, and not for simple maids.' 230 

Then she, who held her eyes upon the ground, 

1 Favour. 



io6 Idylls of the King 

Elaine, and heard her name so tost about, 

Flush'd slightly at the slight disparagement 

Before the stranger knight, who, looking at her, 

Full courtly, yet not falsely, thus return 'd : 235 

' If what is fair be but for what is fair, 

And only queens are to be counted so. 

Rash were my judgment then, who deem this maid 

Might wear as fair a jewel as is on earth, 

Not violating the bond of hke to like.' 240 

He spoke and ceased : the lily maid Elaine, 
Won by the mellow voice before she look'd, 
Lifted her eyes, and read his lineaments. 
The great and guilty love he bare the Queen, 
In battle with the love he bare his lord, 245 

Had marr'd his face, and mark'd it ere his time. 
Another sinning on such heights with one, 
The flower of all the west and all the world, 
Had been the sleeker for it : but in him 
His mood was often like a fiend, and rose 250 

And drove him into wastes and solitudes 
For agony, who was yet a living soul. 
Marr'd as he was, he seem'd the goodliest man 
That ever among ladies ate in hall. 
And noblest, when she lifted up her eyes. 255 

However marr'd, of more than twice her years, 
Seam'd with an ancient swordcut on the cheek, 
And bruised and bronzed, she lifted up her eyes 
And loved him, with that love which was her doom. 



Lancelot and Elaine 107 

Then the great knight, the darling of the court, 260 
Loved of the lovehest, into that rude hall 
Stept with all grace, and not with half disdain 
Hid under grace, as in a smaller time. 
But kindly man moving among his kind : 
Whom they with meats and vintage of their best 265 
And talk and minstrel melody entertain 'd. 
And much they ask'd of court and Table Round, 
And ever well and readily answer'd he : 
But Lancelot, when they glanced at Guinevere, 
Suddenly speaking of the wordless man, 270 

Heard from the Baron that, ten years before. 
The heathen caught and reft him of his tongue. 
' He learnt and warn'd me of their fierce design 
Against my house, and him they caught and maim'd ; 
But I, my sons, and little daughter fled 275 

From bonds or death, and dwelt among the woods 
By the great river in a boatman's hut. 
Dull days were those, till our good Arthur broke 
The Pagan yet once more on Badon hill.' 

' O there, great lord, doubtless,' Lavaine said, rapt^ 2S0 
By all the sweet and sudden passion of youth 
Toward greatness in its elder, ' you have fought. 
O tell us — for we live apart — you know 
Of Arthur's glorious wars.' And Lancelot spoke 
And answer'd him at full, as having been 285 

With Arthur in the fight which all day long 
1 Carried away. 



io8 Idylls of the King 

Rang by the white mouth of the violent Glem ; 
And in the four loud battles by the shore 
Of Duglas ; that on Bassa ; then the war 
That thunder'd in and out the gloomy skirts 290 

Of Celidon the forest ; and again 
By castle Gurnion, where the glorious King 
Had on his cuirass ^ worn our Lady's Head, 
Carv'd of one emerald centr'd in a sun 
Of silver rays, that lighten 'd as he breathed ; 295 

And at Caerleon had he help'd his lord, 
When the strong neighings of the wild w^hite Horse 
Set every gilded parapet shuddering ; 
And up in Agned-Cathregonion too, 
And down the waste sand-shores of Trath Treroit, 300 
Where many a heathen fell ; ' and on the mount 
Of Badon I myself beheld the King 
Charge at the head of all his Table Round, 
And all his legions crying Christ and him, 
And break them ; and I saw him, after, stand 305 

High on a heap of slain, from spur to plume 
Red as the rising sun with heathen blood, 
And seeing me, v.-ith a great voice he cried, 
" They are broken, they are broken ! " for the King, 
However mild he seems at home, nor cares 310 

For triumph in our mimic wars, the jousts — 
For if his own knight cast him down, he laughs 
Saying, his knights are better men than he — 
Yet in this heathen war the fire of God 
1 Breast-plate. 



Lancelot and Elaine 109 

Fills him : I never saw his like : there lives 315 

No greater leader.' 

While he utter'd this, 
Low to her own heart said the lily maid, 
'Save your great self, fair lord; ' and when he fell 
From talk of war to traits of pleasantry — 
Being mirthful he, but in a stately kind — 320 

She still took note that when the living smile 
Died from his lips, across him came a cloud 
Of melancholy severe, from which again. 
Whenever in her hovering to and fro 
The lily maid had striven to make him cheer, 325 

There brake a sudden-beaming tenderness 
Of manners and of nature : and she thought 
That all was nature, all, perchance, for her. 
And all night long his face before her lived. 
As when a painter, poring on a face, 330 

Divinely thro' all hindrance finds the man 
Behind it, and so paints him that his face, 
The shape and colour of a mind and life, 
Lives for his children, ever at its best 
And fullest ; so the face before her lived, 335 

Dark-splendid, speaking in the silence, full 
Of noble things, and held her from her sleep. 
Till rathe ^ she rose, half-cheated in the thought 
She needs must bid farewell to sweet Lavaine. 
First as in fear, step after step, she stole 340 

1 Early. 



no Idylls of the King 

Down the long tower-stairs, hesitating: 
Anon, she heard Sir Lancelot cry in the court, 
' This shield, my friend, where is it ? ' and Lavaine 
Past inward, as she came from out the tower. 
There to his proud horse Lancelot turn'd, and smooth 'd 
The glossy shoulder, humming to himself. 346 

Half-envious of the flattering hand, she drew 
Nearer and stood. He look'd, and more amazed 
Than if seven men had set upon him, saw 
The maiden standing in the dewy light. 350 

He had not dream'd she was so beautiful. 
Then came on him a sort of sacred fear. 
For silent, tho' he greeted her, she stood 
Rapt on his face as if it were a God's. 
Suddenly flash'd on her a wild desire, 355 

That he should wear her favour at the tilt. 
She braved a riotous ^ heart in asking for it. 
* Fair lord, whose name I know not — noble it is, 
I well believe, the noblest — will you wear 
My favour at this tourney? ' ' Nay,' said he, 360 

' Fair lady, since I never yet have worn 
Favour of any lady in the lists.^ 
Such is my wont, as those, who know me, know.' 
' Yea, so,' she answer'd ; ' then in wearing mine 
Needs must be lesser likelihood, noble lord, 365 

That those who know should know you.' And he 
turn'd 

1 Fast-beating. 

2 Barriers enclosing a jousting-field. 



Lancelot and Elaine 1 1 1 

Her counsel up and down within his mind, 

And found it true, and answer'd, ' True, my child. 

Well, I will wear it : fetch it out to me : 

What is it ? ' and she told him ' A red sleeve 370 

Broider'd with pearls,' and brought it: then he bound 

Her token on his helmet, with a smile 

Saying, ' I never yet have done so much 

For any maiden Kving,' and the blood 

Sprang to her face and fill'd her with delight ; 375 

But left her all the paler, when Lavaine 

Returning brought the yet-unblazon'd shield, 

His brother's ; which he gave to Lancelot, 

Who parted with his own to fair Elaine : 

' Do me this grace, my child, to have my shield 380 

In keeping till I come.' ' A grace to me,' 

She answer'd, ' twice to-day. I am your squire ! ' 

Whereat Lavaine said, laughing, ' Lily maid. 

For fear our people call you lily maid 

In earnest, let me bring your colour back ; 385 

Once, twice, and thrice : now get you hence to 

bed : ' 
So kiss'd her, and Sir Lancelot his own hand. 
And thus they moved away : she stay'd a minute, 
Then made a sudden step to the gate, and there — 
Her bright hair blown about the serious face 390 

Yet rosy-kindled with her brother's kiss — 
Paused by the gateway, standing near the shield 
In silence, while she watch'd their arms far-off 
Sparkle, until they dipt below the downs. 



112 Idylls of the King 

Then to her tower she climb'd, and took the shield, 395 
There kept it, and so Uved in fantasy. 

Meanwhile the new companions past away 
Far o'er the long backs of the bushless downs. 
To where Sir Lancelot knew there lived a knight 
Not far from Camelot, now for forty years 400 

A hermit, who had pray'd, labour 'd and pray'd. 
And ever labouring had scoop'd himself 
In the white rock a chapel and a hall 
On massive columns, like a shorecliff cave, 
And cells and chambers : all were fair and dry ; 405 
The green light from the meadows underneath 
Struck up and lived along the milky roofs ; 
And in the meadows tremulous aspen-trees 
And poplars made a noise of falling showers. 
And thither wending there that night they bode. 410 

But when the next day broke from underground. 
And shot red fire and shadows thro' the cave. 
They rose, heard mass, broke fast, and rode away : 
Then Lancelot saying, ' Hear, but hold my name 
Hidden, you ride with Lancelot of the Lake,' 415 

Abash'd Lavaine, whose instant reverence. 
Dearer to true young hearts than their own praise, 
But left him leave to stammer, ' Is it indeed ? ' 
And after muttering ' The great Lancelot,' 
At last he got his breath and answer'd, ' One, 420 

One have I seen — that other, our liege lord, 



Lancelot and Elaine 113 

The dread Pendragon/ Britain's King of kings, 

Of whom the people talk mysteriously, 

He will be there — then were I stricken blind 

That minute, I might say that I had seen.' 425 

So spake Lavaine, and when they reach'd the lists 
By Camelot in the meado\v, let his eyes 
Run thro' the peopled - gallery which half round 
Lay like a rainbow fall'n upon the grass, 
Until they found the clear-faced King, who sat 430 

Robed in red samite,^ easily to be known. 
Since to his crown the golden dragon clung, 
And down his robe the dragon writhed in gold. 
And from the carven-work behind him crept 
Two dragons gilded, sloping down to make 435 

Arms for his chair, while all the rest of them 
Thro' knots and loops and folds innumerable 
Fled ever thro' the woodwork, till they found 
The new design wherein they lost themselves, 
Yet with all ease, so tender was the work : 440 

And, in the costly canopy o'er him set, ' 

Blazed the last diamond of the nameless king. 

Then Lancelot answer 'd young Lavaine and said, 
' Me you call great : mine is the firmer seat. 
The truer lance : but there is many a youth 445 

Now crescent,"* who will come to all I am 

1 Chief. 3 Rich silk, woven of six threads. 

2 Crowded. ^ Growing. 
IDYLLS OF THE KING — 8 



114 Idylls of the King 

And overcome it ; and in me there dwells 

No greatness, save it be some far-off touch 

Of greatness to know well I am not great : 

There is the man.' And Lavaine gaped ^ upon him 450 

As on a thing miraculous, and anon 

The trumpets blew ; and then did either side. 

They that assail'd, and they that held the lists. 

Set lance in rest,- strike spur, suddenly move. 

Meet in the midst, and there so furiously 455 

Shock, that a man far-off might well perceive. 

If any man that day were left afield,"^ 

The hard earth shake, and a low thunder of arms. 

And Lancelot bode ^ a little, till he saw^ 

Which were the weaker ; then he hurl'd into it 460 

Against the stronger : little need to speak 

Of Lancelot in his glory ! King, duke, earl, 

Count, baron — whom he smote, he overthrew. 

But in the field were Lancelot's kith -' and kin,*' 
Ranged with the Table Round that held the lists, 465 
Strong men, and wrathful that a stranger knight 
Should do and almost overdo the deeds 
Of Lancelot ; and one said to the other, ' Lo ! 
What is he ? I do not mean the force alone — 
The grace and versatility of the man ! 470 

1 Stared with open mouth. 

2 Support, used to hold the lance in fighting. 
2 I.e. at home, in his fields. * Waited. 

fi Friends. ^ Relations . 



Lancelot and Elaine 1 1 5 

Is it not Lancelot ? ' ' When has Lancelot worn 

Favour of any lady in the lists ? 

Not such his wont, as we, that know him, know.' 

* How then ? who then ? ' a fury seized them all, 

A fiery family passion for the name 475 

Of Lancelot, and a glory one with theirs. 

Theycouch'd^ their spears and prick'd^ their steeds, 

and thus, 
Their plumes driv'n backward by the wind they made 
In moving, all together down upon him 
Bare, as a wild wave in the wide North-sea, 480 

Green-glimmering toward the summit, bears, with all 
Its stormy crests that smoke against the skies, 
Down on a bark, and overbears the bark, 
And him that helms ^ it, so they overbore 
Sir Lancelot and his charger, and a spear 485 

Down-glancing lamed the charger, and a spear 
Prick'd sharply his own cuirass, and the head 
Pierced thro' his side, and there snapt, and remain 'd. 

Then Sir Lavaine did well and worshipf ully ^ ; 
He bore a knight of old repute to the earth, 490 

And brought his horse to Lancelot where he lay. 
He up the side, sweating with agony, got. 
But thought to do^ while he might yet endure, 
And being lustily holpen ^ by the rest, 
His party, — tho' it seem'd half-miracle 495 

1 Lowered into the rest. 2 Spurred. 3 Steers. 

* With honour. ^ Act while his strength lasted. ^ Helped. 



ii6 Idylls of the King 

To those he fought with, — drave his kith and kin, 

And all the Table Round that held the lists, 

Back to the barrier ; then the trumpets blew 

Proclaiming his the prize, who wore the sleeve 

Of scarlet, and the pearls ; and all the knights, 500 

His party, cried, ' Advance and take thy prize 

The diamond ; ' but he answer'd, ' Diamond me 

No diamonds ! ^ for God's love, a little air ! 

Prize me no prizes, for my prize is death ! 

Hence will I, and I charge you, follow me not.' 505 

He spoke, and vanish'd suddenly from the field 
With young Lavaine into the poplar grove. 
There from his charger^ down he slid, and sat, 
Gasping to Sir Lavaine, ' Draw the lance-head : ' 
' Ah my sweet lord Sir Lancelot,' said Lavaine, 510 

' I dread me, if I draw it, you will die.' 
But he, ' I die already with it ; draw — 
Draw,' — and Lavaine drew, and Sir Lancelot gave 
A marvellous great shriek and ghastly groan. 
And half his blood burst forth, and down he sank 515 
For the pure^ pain, and wholly swoon 'd away. 
Then came the hermit out and bare him in. 
There stanch'd his wound ; and there, in daily doubt 
Whether to live or die, for many a week 
Hid from the wide world's rumour by the grove 520 

Of poplars with their noise of falling showers, 
And ever-tremulous aspen-trees, he lay. 

1 Talk not of diamonds. - War-horse. ^ Mere. 



Lancelot and Elaine 117 

But on that day when Lancelot fled the lists, 
His party, knights of utmost North and West, 
Lords of waste marches, kings of desolate isles, 525 

Came round their great Pendragon, saying to him, 
' Lo, Sire, our knight, thro' whom we won the day, 
Hath gone sore wounded, and hath left his prize 
Untaken, crying that his prize is death.' 
' Heaven hinder,' said the King, ' that such an one, 530 
So great a knight as we have seen to-day — 
He seem'd to me another Lancelot — 
Yea, twenty times I thought him Lancelot — 
He must not pass uncared for. Wherefore, rise, 

Gawain, and ride forth and find the knight. 535 
Wounded and wearied needs must he be near. 

1 charge you that you get at once to horse. 

And, knights and kings, there breathes not one of you 

Will deem this prize of ours is rashly given : 

His prowess^ was too wondrous. We will do him 540 

No customary honour : since the knight 

Came not to us, of us to claim the prize. 

Ourselves will send it after. Rise and take 

This diamond, and deliver it, and return, 

And bring us " where he is, and how he fares, 545 

And cease not from your quest until ye find.' 

So saying, from the carven flower above. 
To which it made a restless heart, he took. 
And gave, the diamond : then from where he sat, 

1 Bravery and force. ^ Bring us news. 



ii8 Idylls of the King 

At Arthur's right, with smiling face arose, 550 

With smiHng face and frowning heart, a Prince 

In the mid might and flourish of his May,^ 

Gawain, surnamed The Courteous, fair and strong. 

And after Lancelot, Tristram, and Geraint, 

And Gareth, a good knight, but therewithal 555 

Sir Modred's brother, and the child of Lot, 

Nor often loyal to his word, and now 

Wroth that the King's command to sally forth 

In quest of whom he knew not, made him leave 

The banquet, and concourse of knights and kings. 560 

So all in wrath he got to horse and went ; 
While Arthur to the banquet, dark in mood. 
Past, thinking, ' Is it Lancelot who hath come 
Despite the wound he spake of, all for gain 
Of glory, and hath added wound to wound, 565 

And ridd'n away to die ? ' So fear'd the King, 
And, after two days' tarriance^ there, return'd. 
Then when he saw the Queen, embracing ask'd, 
' Love, are you yet so sick ? ' ' Nay, lord,' she said. 
' And where is Lancelot ? ' Then the Queen amazed, 
' Was he not with you ? won he not your prize ? ' 571 
' Nay, but one like him.' ' Why that like was he.' 
And when the King demanded how she knew. 
Said, ' Lord, no sooner had ye parted from us. 
Than Lancelot told me of a common talk 575 

That men went down before his spear at a touch, 
1 Youthful beauty. 2 Delay. 



Lancelot and Elaine 



119 



But knowing he was Lancelot ; his great name 

Conquer'd ; and therefore would he hide his name 

From all men, ev'n the King, and to this end 

Had made the pretext of a hindering wound, 580 

That he might joust unknown of all, and learn 

If his old prowess were in aught decay 'd ; 

And added, " Our true Arthur, when he learns, 

Will well allow my pretext, as for gain 

Of purer glory." ' 

Then repHed the King: — 585 

' Far lovelier in our Lancelot had it been, 
In Heu of idly dallying with the truth. 
To have trusted me as he hath trusted thee. 
Surely his King and most familiar friend 
Might well have kept his secret. True, indeed, 590 

Albeit ^ I know my knights fantastical,^ 
So fine ^ a fear in our large Lancelot 
Must needs have moved my laughter : now remains 
But little cause for laughter : his own kin — 
111 news, my Queen, for all who love him, this ! — 595 
His kith and kin, not knowing, set upon him ; 
So that he went sore wounded from the field : 
Yet good news too : for goodly hopes are mine 
That Lancelot is no more a lonely heart. 
He wore, against his wont, upon his helm 600 

A sleeve of scarlet, broider'd with great pearls, 
Some gentle maiden's gift.' 

1 Although. 2 Full of fancies. ^ Over-sensitive. 



I20 Idylls of the King 

' Yea, lord,' she said, 
' Thy hopes are mine,' and saying that, she choked, 
And sharply turn'd about to hide her face. 
Past to her chamber, and there flung herself 605 

Down on the great King's couch, and writhed upon it, 
And clench'd her fingers till they bit the palm. 
And shriek'd out ' Traitor ' to the unhearing wall. 
Then flash 'd into wild tears, and rose again, 
And moved about her palace, proud and pale. 610 

Gawain the while thro' all the region round 
Rode with his diamond, wearied of the quest. 
Touch 'd at all points, except the poplar grove, 
And came at last, tho' late, to Astolat : 
Whom glittering in enamell'd arms the maid 615 

Glanced at, and cried, ' What news from Camelot, lord ? 
What of the knight with the red sleeve ? ' 'He won.' 
' I knew it,' she said. ' But parted from the jousts 
Hurt in the side,' whereat she caught her breath ; 
Thro' her own side she felt the sharp lance go ; 620 

Thereon she smote her hand : wellnigh she swoon 'd : 
And, while he gazed wonderingly at her, came 
The Lord of Astolat out, to whom the Prince 
Reported who he was, and on what quest 
Sent, that he bore the prize and could not find 625 

The victor, but had ridd'n a random^ round 
To seek him, and had wearied of the search. 
To whom the Lord of Astolat, ' Bide with us, 

1 Aimless. 



Lancelot and Elaine 121 

And ride no more at random, noble Prince ! 
Here was the knight, and here he left a shield ; 630 

This will he send or come for : furthermore 
Our son is with him ; we shall hear anon, 
Needs must we hear.' To this the courteous Prince 
Accorded with his wonted courtesy, 
Courtesy with a touch of traitor in it, 635 

And stay'd ; and cast his eyes on fair Elaine : 
Where could be found face daintier ? then her shape 
From forehead down to foot, perfect — again 
From foot to forehead exquisitely turn'd : 
' Well — if I bide, lo ! this wild flower for me ! ' 640 

And oft they met among the garden yews. 
And there he set himself to play upon her 
With sallying w^it, free flashes from a height 
Above her, graces of the court, and songs, 
Sighs, and slow smiles, and golden eloquence 645 

And amorous adulation, till the maid 
Rebell'd against it, saying to him, ' Prince, 
O loyal nephew^ of our noble King, 
Why ask you not to see the shield he left, 
Whence you might learn his name ? Why slight your King, 
And lose the quest he sent you on, and prove 651 

No surer than our falcon yesterday, 
Who lost the hern we slipt her at, and went 
To all the winds ? ' ^ ' Nay, by mine head,' said he, 
' I lose it, as we lose the lark in heaven, 655 

O damsel, in the light of your blue eyes ; 
1 Did not return. 



122 Idylls of the King 

But an ye will it let me see the shield.' 

And when the shield was brought, and Gawain saw 

Sir Lancelot's azure lions, crown 'd with gold, 

Ramp in the field, he smote his thigh, and mock'd : 660 

* Right was the King ! our Lancelot ! that true man ! ' 

* And right was I,' she answer 'd merrily, ' I, 
Who dream 'd my knight the greatest knight of all.' 
' And if /dream'd,' said Gawain, ' that you love 

This greatest knight, your pardon ! lo, ye know it ! 665 
Speak therefore : shall I waste myself in vain ? ' 
Full simple was her answer, ' What know I ? 
My brethren have been all my fellowship ; 
And I, when often they have talk'd of love, 
Wish'd it had been my mother, for they talk'd, 670 

Meseem'd, of what they knew not ; so myself — 
/p know not if I know what true love is, 
%ut if I know, then, if I love not him, 
I know there is none other I can love/j 
' Yea, by God's death,' ^ said he, ' ye love him well, 675 
But would not, knew ye what all others know. 
And whom he loves.' ' So be it,' cried Elaine, 
And lifted her fair face and moved away : 
But he pursued her, calling, ' Stay a little ! 
One golden minute's grace ! he wore your sleeve : 680 
Would he break faith with one I may not name ? 
Must our true man change like a leaf at last ? 
Nay — like enow : why then, far be it from me 
To cross our mighty Lancelot in his loves I 
1 By the cross. 



Lancelot and Elaine 123 

And, damsel, for I deem you know full well 685 

Where your great knight is hidden, let me leave 

My quest with you ; the diamond also : here ! 

For if you love, it will be sweet to give it ; 

And if he love, it will be sweet to have it 

From your own hand ; and whether he love or not, 690 

A diamond is a diamond. Fare you well 

A thousand times ! — a thousand times farewell 1 

Yet, if he love, and his love hold, we two 

May meet at court hereafter : there, I think, 

So ye will learn the courtesies of the court, 695 

We two shall know each other.' 

Then he gave, 
And slightly kiss'd the hand to which he gave, 
The diamond, and all wearied of the quest 
Leapt on his horse, and carolling as he went 
A true-love ballad, lightly rode away. 700 

Thence to the court he past ; there told the King 
What the King knew, ' Sir Lancelot is the knight.' 
And added, ' Sir, my Hege, so much I learnt ; 
But fail'd to find him, tho' I rode all round 
The region : but I lighted on the maid 705 

Whose sleeve he wore ; she loves him ; and to her, 
Deeming our courtesy is the truest law, 
I gave the diamond : she will render it ; 
For by mine head she knows his hiding-place.' 

The seldom-frowning King frown'd, and replied, 710 
' Too courteous truly 1 ye shall go no more 



124 Idylls of the King 

On quest of mine, seeing that ye forget 
Obedience is the courtesy due to kings.' 

He spake and parted. Wroth, but all in awe. 
For twenty strokes of the blood, without a word, 715 
Linger'd that other, staring after him ; 
Then shook his hair, strode off, and buzz'd abroad 
About the maid of Astolat, and her love. 
All ears were prick'd at once, all tongues were loosed : 
' The maid of Astolat loves Sir Lancelot, 720 

Sir Lancelot loves the maid of Astolat.' 
Some read the King's face, some the Queen's, and all 
Had marvel what the maid might be, but most 
Predoom'd^ her as unworthy. One old dame 
Came suddenly on the Queen with the sharp news. 725 
She, that had heard the noise of it before, 
But sorrowing Lancelot should have stoop'd so low, 
Marr'd her friend's aim ^ with pale tranquillity. 
So ran the tale hke fire about the court. 
Fire in dry stubble a nine-days' wonder flared : 730 

Till ev'n the knights at banquet twice or thrice 
Forgot to drink to Lancelot and the Queen, 
And pledging ^ Lancelot and the lily maid 
Smiled at each other, while the Queen, who sat 
With lips severely placid, felt the knot 735 

Climb in her throat, and with her feet unseen 
Crush'd the wild passion out against the floor 

1 Judged her before they knew her. ^ Purpose. 

3 Drinking a health. 



Lancelot and Elaine 125 

Beneath the banquet, where the meats became 
As wormwood,^ and she hated all who pledged. 

But far away the maid in Astolat, 740 

Her guiltless rival, she that ever kept 
The one-day-seen Sir Lancelot in her heart, 
Crept to her father, while he mused alone. 
Sat on his knee, stroked his gray face and said, 
' Father, you call me wilful, and the fault 745 

Is yours who let me have my will, and now, 
Sweet father, will you let me lose my wits ? ' 
' Nay,' said he, ' surely.' ' Wherefore, let me hence,' 
She answer'd, 'and find out our dear Lavaine.' 
' Ye will not lose your wits for dear Lavaine : 750 

Bide,' answer'd he : ' we needs must hear anon 
Of him, and of that other.' ' Ay,' she said, 
' And of that other, for I needs must hence 
And find that other, wheresoe'er he be. 
And with mine own hand give his diamond to him, 755 
Lest I be found as faithless in the quest 
As yon proud Prince who left the quest to me. 
Sweet father, I behold him in my dreams 
Gaunt as it were the skeleton of himself, 
Death-pale, for lack of gentle maiden's aid. 760 

The gentler-born the maiden, the more bound. 
My father, to be sweet and serviceable 
To noble knights in sickness, as ye know 
When these have worn their tokens : let me hence 
1 A bitter herb. 



126 Idylls of the King 

I pray you.' Then her father nodding said, 765 

' Ay, ay, the diamond : wit ^ ye well, my child. 
Right fain ^ were I to learn this knight were whole,^ 
Being our greatest : yea, and you must give it — 
And sure I think this fruit is hung too high 
For any mouth to gape for save a queen's — 770 

Nay, I mean nothing : so then, get you gone. 
Being so very wilful you must go.' 

Lightly, her suit ■* allow'd, she slipt away, 
And while she made her ready for her ride, 
Her father's latest word humm'd in her ear, 775 

' Being so very wilful you must go,' 
And changed itself and echo'd in her heart, 
' Being so very wilful you must die.' 
But she was happy enough and shook it off. 
As we shake off the bee that buzzes at us ; 780 

And in her heart she answer'd it and said, 
' What matter, so I help him back to life ? ' 
Then far away with good Sir Torre for guide 
Rode o'er the long backs of the bushless downs 
To Camelot, and before the city-gates 785 

Came on her brother with a happy face 
Making a roan^ horse caper and curvet^ 
For pleasure all about a field of flowers : 
Whom when she saw, * Lavaine,' she cried, 'Lavaine, 
How fares my lord Sir Lancelot? ' He amazed, 790 

1 Know. 2 Glad. ^ In health. * Request. 

^ Bay thickly interspersed with white. ^ Leap. 



Lancelot and Elaine 127 

' Torre and Elaine ! why here ? Sir Lancelot ! 
How know ye my lord's name is Lancelot ? ' 
But when the maid had told him all her tale, 
Then turn'd Sir Torre, and being in his moods 
Left them, and under the strange-statued gate, 795 

Where Arthur's wars were render'd mystically, 
Past up the still rich city to his kin. 
His own far blood, which dwelt at Camelot ; 
And her, Lavaine across the poplar grove 
Led to the caves : there first she saw the casque ^ 800 
Of Lancelot on the wall : her scarlet sleeve, 
Tho' carved and cut, and half the pearls away, 
Stream'd from it still ; and in her heart she laugh'd, 
Because he had not loosed it from his helm. 
But meant once more perchance to tourney in it. 805 
And when they gain'd the cell wherein he slept, 
His battle-writhen ^ arms and mighty hands 
Lay naked on the wolfskin, and a dream 
Of dragging down his enemy made them move. 
Then she that saw him lying unsleek, unshorn, 810 

Gaunt as it were the skeleton of himself, 
Utter'd a little tender dolorous cry. 
The sound not wonted in a place so still 
Woke the sick knight, and while he roll'd his eyes 
Yet blank from sleep, she started to him, saying, 815 
' Your prize the diamond sent you by the King : ' 
His eyes glisten'd : she fancied ' Is it for me ? ' 
And when the maid had told him all the tale 
^ Helmet. 2 Twisted. 



128 Idylls of the King 

Of King and Prince, the diamond sent, the quest 

Assign'd to her not worthy of it, she knelt 820 

Full lowly by the corners of his bed, 

And laid the diamond in his open hand. 

Her face was near, and as we kiss the child 

That does the task assign'd, he kiss'd her face. 

At once she slipt like water to the floor. 825 

* Alas,' he said, ' your ride hath wearied you. 

Rest must you have.' * No rest for me,' she said ; 

' Nay, for near you, fair lord, I am at rest.' 

What might she mean by that ? his large black eyes. 

Yet larger thro' his leanness, dwelt upon her, 830 

Till all her heart's sad secret blazed itself 

In the heart's colours on her simple face ; 

And Lancelot look'd and was perplext in mind. 

And being weak in body said no more ; 

But did not love the colour ; woman's love, 835 

Save one, he not regarded, and so turn'd 

Sighing, and feign'd a sleep until he slept. 

Then rose Elaine and glided thro' the fields. 
And past beneath the weirdly-sculptured gates 
Far up the dim rich city to her kin ; 840 

There bode the night : but woke with dawn, and 

past 
Down thro' the dim rich city to the fields, 
Thence to the cave : so day by day she past 
In either twilight ghost-like to and fro 
Gliding, and every day she tended him. 845 



Lancelot and Elaine 129 

And likewise many a night : and Lancelot 

Would, tho' he call'd his wound a little hurt 

Whereof he should be quickly whole, at times 

Brain -feverous in his heat and agony, seem 

Uncourteous, even he : but the meek maid 850 

Sweetly forebore him ever, being to him 

Meeker than any child to a rough nurse, 

Milder than any mother to a sick child, 

And never woman yet, since man's first fall, 

Did kindlier unto man, but her deep love 855 

Upbore her ; till the hermit, skill'd in all 

The simples ^ and the science of that time. 

Told him that her fine care had saved his life. 

And the sick man forgot her simple blush, 

Would call her friend and sister, sweet Elaine, 860 

Would listen for her coming and regret 

Her parting step, and held her tenderly. 

And loved her with all love except the love 

Of man and woman when they love their best. 

Closest and sweetest, and had died the death 865 

In any knightly fashion for her sake. 

And peradventure had he seen her first 

She might have made this - and that other world ^ 

Another world for the sick man ; but now 

The shackles of an old love straiten'd ^ him, 870 

His honour rooted in dishonour stood. 

And faith unfaithful kept him falsely true. 

1 Medicinal plants. 2 Earth. ^ Heaven. 

4 Held him fast. 

IDYLLS OF THE KING — 9 



I JO Idylls of the King ^ . 

Yet the great knight in his mid-sickness made 
Full many a holy vow and pure resolve. 
These, as but born of sickness, could not live : 875 

For when the blood ran lustier in him again, 
Full often the bright image of one face,^ 
Making a treacherous quiet in his heart, 
Dispersed his resolution like a cloud. 
Then if the maiden, while that ghostly^ grace 880 

Beam'd on his fancy, spoke, he answer'd not, 
Or short and coldly, and she knew right well 
What the rough sickness meant, but what this meant 
She knew not, and the sorrow dimm'd her sight. 
And drave her ere her time across the fields 885 

Far into the rich city, where alone 
She murmur'd, ' Vain, in vain : it cannot be. 
He will not love me : how then ? must I die ? ' 
Then as a little helpless innocent bird. 
That has but one plain passage of few notes, 890 

Will sing the simple passage o'er and o'er 
For all an April morning, till the ear 
Wearies to hear it, so the simple maid 
Went half the night repeating, ' Must I die ? ' 
And now to right she turn'd, and now to left, S95 

And found no ease in turning or in rest ; 
And 'Him or death,' she mutter 'd, ' death or him,' 
Again and like a burthen, * Him or death.' 

But when Sir Lancelot's deadly hurt was whole, 
1 Guinevere. 2 Spiritual, imaginary. 



Lancelot and Elaine 131 

To Astolat returning rode the three. 900 

There morn by morn, arraying her sweet self 

In that wherein she deem'd she look'd her best, 

She came before Sir Lancelot, for she thought 

' If I be loved, these are my festal robes. 

If not, the victim's flowers before he fall.' 905 

And Lancelot ever prest upon the maid 

That she should ask some goodly gift of him 

For her own self or hers ; ' and do not shun 

To speak the wish most near to your true heart ; 

Such service have ye done me, that I make 910 

My will of yours, and Prince and Lord am I 

In mine own land, and while I will I can.' 

Then like a ghost she lifted up her face, 

But like a ghost without the power to speak. 

And Lancelot saw that she withheld her wish, 915 

And bode among them yet a little space 

Till he should learn it ; and one morn it chanced 

He found her in among the garden yews. 

And said, ' Delay no longer, speak your wish. 

Seeing I go to-day : ' then out she brake : 920 

' Going ? and we shall never see you more. 

And I must die for want of one bold word.' 

' Speak : that I live to hear,' he said, ' is yours.' ^ 

Then suddenly and passionately she spoke : 

' I have gone mad. I love you : let m.e die.' 925 

' Ah, sister,' answer 'd Lancelot, ' what is this ? ' 

And innocently extending her white arms, 

1 Your care has kept me alive to hear you. 



132 Idylls of the King 

* Your love,' she said, ' your love — to be your wife.' 
And Lancelot answer'd, ' Had I chosen to wed, 

I had been wedded earlier, sweet Elaine : 930 

But now there never will be wife of mine.' 

* No, no,' she cried, ' I care not to be wife, 
But to be with you still, to see your face. 

To serve you, and to follow you thro' the world.' 

And Lancelot answer'd, ' Nay, the world, the world, 935 

All ear and eye, with such a stupid heart 

To interpret ear and eye, and such a tongue 

To blare its own interpretation — nay. 

Full ill then should I quit ^ your brother's love. 

And your father's kindness.' And she said, 940 

* Not to be with you, not to see your face — 
Alas for me then, my good days are done.' 

' Nay, noble maid,' he answer'd, ' ten times nay ! 
This is not love : but love's first flash in youth. 
Most common : yea, I know it of mine own self : 945 
And you yourself will smile at your own self 
Hereafter, when you yield your flower of life 
To one more fitly yours, not thrice your age : 
And then will I, for true you are and sweet 
Beyond mine old belief in womanhood, 950 

More specially should your good knight be poor, 
Endow you with broad land and territory 
Even to the half my realm beyond the seas, 
So that would make you happy : furthermore, 
Ev'n to the death, as tho' ye were my blood,^ 955 

1 Reward. '-^ Of my family. 



Lancelot and Elaine 133 

In all your quarrels will I be your knight. 
This will I do, dear damsel, for your sake, 
And more than this I cannot' 

While he spoke 
She neither blush'd nor shook, but deathly-pale 
Stood grasping what was nearest, then replied : 960 

' Of all this will I nothing ; ' and so fell, 
And thus they bore her swooning to her tower. 

Then spake, to whom thro' those black walls of yew^ 
Their talk had pierced, her father : ' Ay, a flash, 
I fear me, that will strike my blossom dead. 965 

Too courteous are ye, fair Lord Lancelot. 
I pray you, use some rough discourtesy 
To blunt or break her passion.' 

Lancelot said, 
' That were against ^ me : what I can I will ; ' 
And there that day remain'd, and toward even 970 

Sent for his shield ; full meekly rose the maid, 
Stript off the case, and gave the naked shield ; 
Then, when she heard his horse upon the stones. 
Unclasping flung the casement back, and look'd 
Down on his helm, from which her sleeve had gone. 975 
And Lancelot knew the little clinking sound ; 
And she by tact ^ of love was well aware 
That Lancelot knew that she was looking at him. 
And yet he glanced not up, nor waved his hand, 
1 Contrary to my nature. ^ Quick feeling or insight. 



134 Idylls of the King 

Nor bade farewell, but sadly rode away. 980 

This was the one discourtesy that he used. 

So in her tower alone the maiden sat ; 
His very shield was gone ; only the case, 
Her own poor work, her empty labour, left. 
But still she heard him, still his picture form'd 985 

And grew between her and the pictured wall. 
Then came her father, saying in low tones, 
* Have comfort,' whom she greeted quietly. 
Then came her brethren saying, ' Peace to thee, 
Sweet sister,' whom she answer 'd with all calm. 990 

But when they left her to herself again. 
Death, like a friend's voice from a distant field 
Approaching thro' the darkness, call'd ; the owls 
Wailing had power upon her, and she mixt ^^ 
Her fancies with the sallow-rifted glooms ^ 995 

Of evening, and the moanings of the wind. 

And in those days she made a little song, 
And call'd her song ' The Song of Love and Death,' 
And sang it : sweetly could she make and sing. 

' ' Sweet is true love tho' given in vain, in vain ; 1000 
And sweet is death who puts an end to pain : 
1 1 know not which is sweeter, no, not I. 

' Love, art thou sweet ? then bitter death must be : 
Love, thou art bitter ; sweet is death to me. 
O Love, if death be sweeter, let me die. 1005 

1 Cloudy skies with yellow streaks of light between. 



Lancelot and Elaine 135 

' Sweet love, that seems not made to fade away, 
Sweet death, that seems to make us loveless clay, 
I know not which is sweeter, no, not I. 

' I fain would follow love, if that could be ; 
I needs must follow death, who calls for me ; loio 

Call and I follow, I follow! let me die.' 

High with the last line scaled her voice, and this, 
All in a fiery dawning wild with wind 
That shook her tower, the brothers heard, and thought 
With shuddering, ' Hark the Phantom of the house 1015 
That ever shrieks before a death,' and call'd 
The father, and all three in hurry and fear 
Ran to her, and lo 1 the blood-red light of dawn 
Flared on her face, she shrilling, ' Let me die ! ' 

As when we dwell upon a word we know, 1020 

Repeating, till the word we know so well 
Becomes a wonder, and we know not why, 
So dwelt the father on her face, and thought 
' Is this Elaine ? ' till back the maiden fell, 
Then gave a languid hand to each, and lay, 1025 

Speaking a still good-morrow with her eyes. 
At last she said, ' Sweet brothers, yesternight 
I seem'd a curious ^ little maid again. 
As happy as when we dwelt among the woods, 
And when ye used to take me with the flood 1030 

Up the great river in the boatman's boat. 

1 Inquisitive. 



136 Idylls of the King 

Only ye would not pass beyond the cape 

That has the poplar on it : there ye fixt 

Your limit, oft returning with the tide. 

And yet I cried because ye would not pass 1035 

Beyond it, and far up the shining flood 

Until we found the palace of the King. 

And yet ye would not ; but this night I dream 'd 

That I was all alone upon the flood, 

And then I said, " Now shall I have my will : " 1040 

And there I woke, but still the wish remain'd. 

So let me hence that I may pass at last 

Beyond the poplar and far up the flood. 

Until I find the palace of the King. 

There will I enter in among them all, 1045 

And no man there will dare to mock at me ; 

But there the fine Gawain will wonder at me. 

And there the great Sir Lancelot muse ^ at me ; 

Gawain, who bade a thousand farewells to me, 

Lancelot, who coldly went, nor bade me one : 1050 

And there the King will know me and my love. 

And there the Queen herself will pity me. 

And all the gentle court will welcome me, 

And after my long voyage I shall rest ! ' 

' Peace,' said her father, ' O my child, ye seem 10-5 
Light-headed, for what forCe - is yours to go 
So far, being sick ? and wherefore would ye look 
On this proud fellow again, who scorns us all? ' 
1 Wonder. 2 Strength. 



Lancelot and Elaine 137 

Then the rough Torre began to heave and move, 
And bluster into stormy sobs and say, 1060 

* I never loved him : an I meet with him, 
I care not howsoever great he be. 

Then will I strike at him and strike him down. 

Give me good fortune, I will strike him dead. 

For this discomfort he hath done the house.' 1065 

To whom the gentle sister made reply, 
' Fret not yourself, dear brother, nor be wroth, 
Seeing it is no more Sir Lancelot's fault 
Not to love me, than it is mine to love 
Him of all men who seems to me the highest.' 1070 

' Highest ? ' the father answer'd, echoing ' highest ? ' 
(He meant to break the passion in her) ' nay. 
Daughter, I know not what you call the highest ; 
But this I know, for all the people know it, 
He loves the Queen, and in an open shame : 1075 

And she returns his love in open shame ; 
If this be high, what is it to be low ? ' 

Then spake the lily maid of Astolat : 

* Sweet father, all too faint and sick am I 

For anger : these are slanders : never yet 1080 

Was noble man but made ignoble talk. 

He makes no friend who never made a foe. 

But now it is my glory to have loved 

One peerless,^ without stain : so let me pass, 

1 Unequalled. 



138 Idylls of the King 

My father, howsoe'er I seem to you, 1085 

Not all unhappy, having loved God's best 

And greatest, tho' my love had no return : 

Yet, seeing you desire your child to live. 

Thanks, but you work against your own desire ; 

For if I could believe the things you say 1090 

I should but die the sooner ; wherefore cease, 

Sweet father, and bid call the ghostly^ man 

Hither, and let me shrive^ me clean, and die.' 

So when the ghostly man had come and gone, 
She with a face, bright as for sin forgiven, 1095 

Besought Lavaine to write as she devised 
A letter, word for word ; and when he ask'd 

* Is it for Lancelot, is it for my dear lord ? 
Then will I bear it gladly ; ' she replied, 

* For Lancelot and the Queen and all the world, noo 
But I myself must bear it.' Then he wrote 

The letter she devised ; which being writ 

And folded, ' O sweet father, tender and true. 

Deny me not,' she said — * ye never yet 

Denied my fancies — this, however strange, 1105 

My latest : lay the letter in my hand 

A little ere I die, and close the hand 

Upon it ; I shall guard it even in death. 

And when the heat is gone from out my heart, 

Then take the little bed on which I died mo 

1 Spiritual, the priest. 

2 Make confession and receive absolution. 



Lancelot and Elaine 139 

For Lancelot's love, and deck^ it like the Queen's 

For richness, and me also hke the Queen 

In all I have of rich, and lay me on it. 

And let there be prepared a chariot-bier - 

To take me to the river, and a barge 1115 

Be ready on the river, clothed in black. 

I go in state to court, to meet the Queen. 

There surely I shall speak for mine own self, 

And none of you can speak for me so well. 

And therefore let our dumb old man alone 1120 

Go with me, he can steer and row, and he 

Will guide me to that palace, to the doors.' 

She ceased : her father promised ; whereupon 
She grew so cheerful that they deem'd her death 
Was rather in the fantasy than the blood. 1125 

But ten slow mornings past, and on the eleventh 
Her father laid the letter in her hand. 
And closed the hand upon it, and she died. 
So that day there was dole " in Astolat. 

But when the next sun brake from underground, 1130 
Then, those two brethren slowly with bent brows, 
Accompanying, the sad chariot-bier 
Past like a shadow thro' the field, that shone 
Full-summer, to that stream whereon the barge, 
Pall'd^ all its length in blackest samite, lay. 1135 

There sat the lifelong creature of the house, 

1 Adorn. ^ Funeral-carriage. ^ Grief. * Covered. 



140 Idylls of the King 

Loyal, the dumb old servitor, on deck, 

Winking his eyes, and twisted all his face, 

So those two brethren from the chariot took 

And on the black decks laid her in her bed, 1140 

Set in her hand a lily, o'er her hung 

The silken case with braided blazonings, 

And kiss'd her quiet brows, and saying to her, 

' Sister, farew^ell for ever,' and again 

* Farewell, sweet sister,' parted all in tears. 1145 

Then rose the dumb old servitor, and the dead, 

Oar'd by the dumb, went upward with the flood — 

In her right hand the lily, in her left 

The letter — all her bright hair streaming down — 

And all the coverlid was cloth of gold 1150 

Drawn to her waist, and she herself in white 

All but her face, and that clear-featured face 

Was lovely, for she did not seem as dead. 

But fast asleep, and lay as tho' she smiled. 

That day Sir Lancelot at the palace craved 1155 

Audience of Guinevere, to give at last 
The price of half a realm, his costly gift, 
Hard-won and hardly won with bruise and blow, 
With deaths of others, and almost his own. 
The nine-years-fought-for diamonds : for he saw 
One of her house, and sent him to the Queen 
Bearing his wish, whereto the Queen agreed 
With such and so unmoved a majesty 
She might have seem'd her statue, but that he, 



1160 



Lancelot and Elaine 141 

Low-drooping till he wellnigh kiss'd her feet 1165 

For loyal awe, saw^ with a sidelong eye 
The shadow of some piece of pointed lace, 
In the Queen's shadow, vibrate on the walls, 
And parted, laughing in his courtly heart. 

All in an oriel ' on the summer^ side, 1170 

Vine-clad, of Arthur's palace toward the stream, 
They met, and Lancelot kneeling utter'd, ' Queen, 
Lady, my liege,^ in whom I have my joy, 
Take, what I had not won except for you, 
These jewels, and make me happy, making them 1175 
An armlet for the roundest arm on earth. 
Or necklace for a neck to which the swan's 
Is tawnier than her cygnet's * : these are words : 
Your beauty is your beauty, and I sin 
In speaking, yet O grant my worship of it 1180 

Words, as we grant grief tears. Such sin in words 
Perchance, we both can pardon : but, my Queen, 
I hear of rumours flying thro' your court. 
Our bond, as not the bond of man and wife, 
Should have in it an absoluter trust 11S5 

To make up that defect : let rumours be : 
When did not rumours fly ? these, as I trust 
That you trust me in your own nobleness, 
I may not well believe that you believe.' 

1 A window built out from a wall, on a bracket. 

2 Southern. ^ Sovereign. * Young swan. 



142 Idylls of the King 

While thus he spoke, half -turn 'd away, the Queen 1190 
Brake from the vast oriel-embowering vine 
Leaf after leaf, and tore, and cast them off, 
Till all the place whereon she stood was green ; 
Then, when he ceased, in one cold passive hand 
Received at once and laid aside the gems 1195 

There on a table near her, and replied : 

' It may be, I am quicker of behef 
Than you believe me, Lancelot of the Lake. 
Our bond is not the bond of man and wife. 
This good is in it, whatsoe'er of ill, 1200 

It can be broken easier. I for you 
This many a year have done despite and wrong 
To one whom ever in my heart of hearts 
I did acknowledge nobler. What are these ? 
Diamonds for me ! they had been thrice their worth 1205 
Being your gift, had you not lost your own.^ 
To loyal hearts the value of all gifts 
Must vary as the giver's. Not for me ! 
For her ! for your new fancy." Only this 
Grant me, I pray you : have your joys apart.^ 1210 

I doubt not that however changed, you keep 
So much of what is graceful : and myself 
Would shun to break those bounds of courtesy 
In which as Arthur's Queen I move and rule : 
So cannot speak my mind. An end to this ! 1215 

1 Your own worth. ^ fhe lady of the red sleeve. 

2 Away from me. 



Lancelot and Elaine 143 

A strange one ! yet I take it with Amen. 

So pray you, add my diamonds to her pearls ; 

Deck her with these ; tell her she shines me down : 

An armlet for an arm to which the Queen's 

Is haggard, or a necklace for a neck 1220 

O as much fairer — as a faith once fair 

Was richer than these diamonds — hers not mine — 

Nay, by the mother of our Lord himself, 

Or hers or mine, mine now to work my will — 

She shall not have them.' 

Saying which she seized, 1225 
And, thro' the casement ^ standing wide for heat, 
Flung them, and down they flash'd, and smote the 

stream. 
Then from the smitten surface flash'd, as it were, 
Diamonds to meet them, and they past away. 
Then while Sir Lancelot leant, in half disdain 1230 

At love, life, all things, on the window ledge, 
Close underneath his eyes, and right across 
Where these had fallen, slowly past the barge 
Whereon the lily maid of Astolat 
Lay smiling, hke a star in blackest night. 1235 

But the wild Queen, who saw not, burst away 
To weep and wail in secret ; and the barge. 
On to the palace-doorway sliding, paused. 
There two stood arm'd, and kept the door ; to whom, 

1 Window opening on a hinge. 



144 Idylls of the King 

All up the marble stair, tier over tier, 1240 

Were added mouths that gaped, and eyes that ask'd 

' What is it ? ' but that oarsman's haggard face, 

As hard and still as is the face that men 

Shape to their fancy's eye from broken rocks 

On some cliff-side, appall'd them, and they said, 1245 

' He is enchanted, cannot speak — and she. 

Look how she sleeps — the Fairy Queen, so fair ! 

Yea, but how pale ! what are they ? flesh and blood ? 

Or come to take the King to Fairyland ? 

For some do hold our Arthur cannot die, 1250 

But that he passes into Fairyland.' 

While thus they babbled of the King, the King 
Came girt ^ with knights : then turn'd the tongueless man 
From the half-face^ to the full eye,^ and rose 
And pointed to the damsel, and the doors. 1255 

So Arthur bade the meek Sir Percivale 
And pure Sir Galahad to uplift the maid ; 
And reverently they bore her into hall. 
Then came the fine Gawain and wonder'd at her, 
And Lancelot later came and mused at her, 1260 

And last the Queen herself, and pitied her : 
But Arthur spied the letter in her hand, 
Stoopt, took, brake seal, and read it ; this was all : 

' Most noble lord, Sir Lancelot of the Lake, 
I, sometime call'd the maid of Astolat, 1265 

1 Surrounded. 2 Profile. ^ Fronting them. 



Lancelot and Elaine 145 

Come, for you left me taking no farewell, 

Hither, to take my last farewell of you. 

I loved you, and my love had no return. 

And therefore my true love has been my death. 

And therefore to our Lady Guinevere, 1270 

And to all other ladies, I make moan : 

Pray for my soul, and yield me burial. 

Pray for my soul thou too, Sir Lancelot, 

As thou art a knight peerless.' 

Thus he read ; 
And ever in the reading, lords and dames 1275 

Wept, looking often from his face who read 
To hers which lay so silent, and at times. 
So touch'd were they, half-thinking that her lips. 
Who had devised the letter, moved again. 
Then freely spoke Sir Lancelot to them all : 1280 

' My lord liege Arthur, and all ye that hear. 
Know that for this most gentle maiden's death 
Right heavy am I ; for good she was and true, 
But loved me with a love beyond all love 
In women, whomsoever I have known. 1285 

Yet to be loved makes not to love again ; 
Not at my years, however it hold in youth. 
I swear by truth and knighthood that I gave 
No cause, not willingly, for such a love : 
To this I call my friends in testimony, 1290 

Her brethren, and her father, who himself 
Besought me to be plain and blunt, and use, 

IDYLLS OF THE KING — lO 



146 Idylls of the King 

To break her passion, some discourtesy 

Against my nature : what I could, I did. 

I left her and I bade her no farewell ; 1295 

Tho', had I dreamt the damsel would have died, 

I might have put my wits to some rough use. 

And help'd her from herself.' 

Then said the Queen 
(Sea was her wrath, yet working after storm), 
' Ye might at least have done her so much grace, 1300 
Fair lord, as would have help'd^ her from her death.' 
He raised his head, their eyes met and hers fell. 
He adding, 

' Queen, she would not be content 
Save that I wedded her, which could not be. 
Then might she follow me thro' the world, she 
ask'd ; 1305 

It could not be. I told her that her love 
Was but the flash of youth, would darken down 
To rise hereafter in a stiller flame 
Toward one more worthy of her — then would I, 
More specially were he, she wedded, poor, 1310 

Estate ^ them with large land and territory 
In mine own realm beyond the narrow seas,^ 
To keep them in all joyance : more than this 
I could not ; this she would not, and she died.' 

He pausing, Arthur answer'd, ' O my knight, 1315 

^ Hindered. '^ Provide, endow. ^ xhe English Channel. 



Lancelot and Elaine 147 

It will be to thy worship,^ as my knight, 
And mine, as head of all our Table Round, 
To see that she be buried worshipfully.' 

So toward that shrine - which then in all the realm 
Was richest, Arthur leading, slowly went 1320 

The marshall'd Order of their Table Round, 
And Lancelot sad beyond his wont, to see 
The maiden buried, not as one unknown, 
Not meanly, but with gorgeous obsequies, 
And mass, and rolling music, like a queen. 1325 

And when the knights had laid her comely head 
Low in the dust of half-forgotten kings. 
Then Arthur spake among them, ' Let her tomb 
Be costly, and her image thereupon, 
And let the shield of Lancelot at her feet 1330 

Be carven, and her lily in her hand. 
And let the story of her dolorous voyage 
For all true hearts be blazon'd on her tomb 
In letters gold and azure ^ ! ' which was wrought 
Thereafter ; but when now the lords and dames 1335 
And people, from the high door streaming, brake 
Disorderly, as homeward each, the Queen, 
Who mark'd Sir Lancelot where he moved apart. 
Drew near, and sigh'd in passing, ' Lancelot, 
Forgive me ; mine was jealousy in love.' 1340 

He answer 'd with his eyes upon the ground, 
' That is love's curse ; pass on, my Queen, forgiven.' 

1 Honour. 2 Westminster. ^ Blue. 



148 Idylls of the King 

But Arthur, who beheld his cloudy brows, 
Approach'd him, and with full affection said, 

' Lancelot, my Lancelot, thou in whom I have 1345 
Most joy and most affiance,^ for I know 
What thou hast been in battle by my side, 
And many a time have watch 'd thee at the tilt 
Strike down the lusty and long-practised knight, 
And let the younger and unskill'd go by 1350 

To win his honour and to make his name, 
And loved thy courtesies and thee, a man 
Made to be loved ; but now I would to God, 
Seeing the homeless trouble in thine eyes, 
Thou couldst have loved this maiden, shaped, it seems, 
By God for thee alone, and from her face, 1356 

If one may judge the living by the dead. 
Delicately pure and marvellously fair, 
Who might have brought thee, now a lonely man 
Wifeless and heirless, noble issue, sons 1360 

Born to the glory of thy name and fame. 
My knight, the great Sir Lancelot of the Lake.' 

Then answer'd Lancelot, ' Fair she was, my King, 
Pure, as you ever wish your knights to be. 
To doubt her fairness were to want an eye, 1365 

To doubt her pureness were to want a heart — 
Yea, to be loved, if what is worthy love 
Could bind him, but free love will not be bound.' 

1 Trust 



Lancelot and Elaine 149 

'Free love, so bound, were freest,' said the King. 
' Let love be free ; free love is for the best : 1370 

And, after heaven, on our dull side of death, 
What should be best, if not so pure a love 
Clothed in so pure a loveliness ? yet thee 
She fail'd to bind, tho' being, as I think, 
Unbound as yet, and gentle, as I know.' 1375 

And Lancelot answer'd nothing, but he went, 
And at the inrunning of a little brook 
Sat by the river in a cove, and watch 'd 
The high reed wave, and lifted up his eyes 
And saw the barge that brought her moving down, 1380 
Far-off, a blot upon the stream, and said 
Low in himself, ' Ah, simple heart and sweet, 
Ye loved me, damsel, surely with a love 
Far tenderer than my Queen's. Pray for thy soul ? 
Ay, that will I. Farewell too — now at last — 1385 

Farewell, fair lily. J " Jealousy in love ? " 
Not rather dead love's harsh heir, jealous pride?! 
Queen, if I grant the jealousy as of love, ' 

May not your crescent fear for name and fame 
Speak, as it waxes, of a love that wanes ? 1390 

Why did the King dwell on my name to me ? 
Mine own name shames me, seeming a reproach, 
Lancelot, whom the Lady of the Lake 
Caught from his mother's arms — the wondrous one 
Who passes thro' the vision of the night — 1395 

She chanted snatches of mysterious hymns 



150 Idylls of the King 

Heard on the winding waters, eve and morn 

She kiss'd me saying, " Thou art fair, my child. 

As a king's son," and often in her arms 

She bare me, pacing on the dusky mere. 1400 

Would she had drown'd me in it, where'er it be ! 

For what am I ? what profits me my name 

Of greatest knight ? I fought for it, and have it : 

Pleasure to have it, none ; to lose it, pain ; 

Now grown a part of me : but what use in it ? 1405 

To make men worse by making my sin known ? 

Or sin seem less, the sinner seeming great ? 

Alas for Arthur's greatest knight, a man 

Not after Arthur's heart ! I needs must break 

These bonds that so defame me : not without 1410 

She^ wills it : would I, if she will'd it? nay. 

Who knows ? but if I would not, then may God, 

I pray him, send a sudden Angel down 

To seize me by the hair and bear me far, 

And fling me deep in that forgotten mere, 1415 

Among the tumbled fragments of the hills.' 

So groan'd Sir Lancelot in remorseful pain, 
Not knowing he should die a holy man. 

1 Guinevere. 



THE PASSING OF ARTHUR 

That story which the bold Sir Bedivere, 
First made and latest left of all the knights, 
Told, when the man was no more than a voice 
In the white winter of his age, to those 
With whom he dwelt, new faces, other minds. 

For on their march to westward, Bedivere, 
Who slowly paced among the slumbering host, 
Heard in his tent the moanings of the King : 

' I found Him in the shining of the stars, 
I mark'd Him in the flowering of His fields. 
But in His ways with men I find Him not. 
I waged His wars, and now I pass ^ and die, 
O me ! for why is all around us here 
As if some lesser god had made the world. 
But had not force to shape it as he would. 
Till the High God behold it from beyond. 
And enter it, and make it beautiful ? 
Or else as if the world were wholly fair. 
But that these eyes of men are dense and dim, 
And have not power to see it as it is : 

1 Depart. 
151 



152 Idylls of the King 

Perchance, because we see not to the close ; — 

For I, being simple, thought to work His will, 

And have but stricken with the sword in vain ; 

And all whereon I lean'd in wife and friend 

Is traitor to my peace, and all my realm 25 

Reels back into the beast,^ and is no more. 

My God, thou hast forgotten me in my death : 

Nay — God my Christ — I pass but shall not die.' 

Then, ere that last weird battle in the west, 
There came on Arthur sleeping, Gawain kill'd 30 

In Lancelot's war, the ghost of Gawain blown 
Along a wandering wind, and past his ear 
Went shrilling,^ ' Hollow, hollow all delight ! 
Hail, King ! to-morrow thou shalt pass away. 
Farewell ! there is an isle of rest for thee. 35 

And I am blown along a wandering wind. 
And hollow, hollow, hollow all delight.' 
And fainter onward, like wild birds that change 
Their season ^ in the night and wail their way 
From cloud to cloud, down the long wind the dream 40 
Shrill'd ; but in going mingled vvilh dim cries 
Far in the moonlit haze among the hills, 
As of some lonely city sack'd by night, 
When all is lost, and wife and child with wail ^ 
Pass to new lords , and Arthur woke and call'd, 45 

' Who spake? A dream. O light upon the wind, 

1 Sinks into wild disorder. ^ Crying shrilly. 

2 Migrate. * Cries of mourning. 



The Passing of Arthur 153 

Thine, Gawain, was the voice — are these dim cries 
Thine ? or doth all that haunts the waste and wild 
Mourn, knowing it will go along with me ? ' 

This heard the bold Sir Bedivere and spake : 50 

' O me, my King, let pass whatever will, 
Elves,^ and the harmless glamour of the field ; 
But in their stead thy name and glory cling 
To all high places like a golden cloud 
For ever : but as yet thou shalt not pass. 55 

Light was Gawain in life, and light in death 
Is Gawain, for the ghost is as the man ; 
And care not thou for dreams from him, but rise — 
I hear the steps of Modred in the west. 
And with him many of thy people, and knights 60 

Once thine, whom thou hast loved, but grosser grown 
Than heathen, spitting at their vows and thee. 
Right well in heart they know thee for the King. 
Arise, go forth and conquer as of old.' 

Then spake King Arthur to Sir Bedivere : 65 

' Far other is this battle in the west 
Whereto we move, than when we strove in youth,' 
And brake the petty kings, and fought with Rome, 
Or thrust the heathen from the Roman wall, 
And shook him thro' the north. Ill doom is mine 70 
To war against my people and my knights. 
The king who fights his people fights himself. 

1 Fairies. 



154 Idylls of the King 

And they my knights, who loved me once, the stroke 

That strikes them dead is as my death to me. 

Yet let us hence, and find or feel a way 75 

Thro' this blind haze, which ever since I saw 

One ^ lying in the dust at Almesbury, 

Hath folded in the passes^ of the world.' 

Then rose the King and moved his host by night. 
And ever push'd Sir Modred, league by league, 80 

Back to the sunset bound of Lyonesse — 
.\ land of old upheaven^ from the abyss 
By fire, to sink into the abyss again ; 
Where fragments of forgotten peoples dwelt, 
And the long mountains ended in a coast 85 

Of ever-shifting ^ sand, and far away 
The phantom circle ^ of a moaning sea. 
There the pursuer could pursue no more. 
And he that fled no further fly the King ; 
And there, that day when the great light of heaven 90 
Burn'd at his lowest^ in the rolling year. 
On the waste sand by the waste sea they closed. 
Nor ever yet had Arthur fought a fight 
Like this last, dim, weird battle of the west. 
A deathwhite mist slept over sand and sea : 95 

Whereof the chill, to him who breathed it, drew 
Down with his blood, till all his heart was cold 

1 The Queen. 2 Befogged the roads. 

8 By volcanic action. ^ Quicksands. 

^ Distant horizon. ^ December 22. 



The Passing of Arthur 155 

With formless fear ; and ev'n on Arthur fell 

Confusion, since he saw not whom he fought. 

For friend and foe were shadows in the mist, 100 

And friend slew friend not knowing whom he slew ; 

And some had visions out of golden youth, 

And some beheld the faces of old ghosts 

Look in upon the battle ; and in the mist 

Was many a noble deed, many a base, 105 

And chance and craft and strength in single fights, 

And ever and anon with host to host 

Shocks, and the splintering spear, the hard maiP hewn. 

Shield-breakings, and the clash of brands, the crash 

Of battleaxes on shatter'd helms, and shrieks no 

After the Christ, of those who falling down 

Look'd up for heaven, and only saw the mist ; 

And shouts of heathen and the traitor knights. 

Oaths, insult, filth, and monstrous blasphemies, 

Sweat, writhings, anguish, labouring of the lungs 115 

In that close mist, and cryings for the light, 

Moans of the dying, and voices of the dead. 

Last, as by some one deathbed after wail 
Of suffering, silence follows, or thro' death 
Or deathlike swoon, thus over all that shore, 120 

Save for some whisper of the seething seas, 
A dead hush fell ; but when the dolorous day 
Grew drearier toward twilight falling, came 
A bitter wind, clear from the North, and blew 
1 Armour. 



156 Idylls of the King 

The mist aside, and with that wind the tide 125 

Rose, and the pale King glanced across the field 

Of battle : but no man was moving there ; 

Nor any cry of Christian heard thereon, 

Nor yet of heathen ; only the wan wave 

Brake in among dead f.-ces, to and fro 130 

Swaying the helpless hand-, and up and down 

Tumbling the hollow helmets of the fallen, 

And shiver'd brands that once had fought with Rome, 

And rolling far along the gloomy shares 

The voice of days of old and days to be. 135 

Then spake King Arthur to Sir Bedivere, 
And whiter than the mist that all day long 
Had held the field of battle was the King : 

' Hearest thou this great voice that shakes the world, 
And wastes the narrow realm whereon we move, 140 
And beats upon the faces of the dead. 
My dead, as tho' they had not died for me ? — 
O Bedivere, for on my heart hath fall'n 
Confusion, till I know not what I am, 
Nor whence I am, nor whether I be King, 145 

Behold, I seem but King among the dead.' 

Then spake the bold Sir Bedivere : ' My King, 
King everywhere ! and so the dead have kings, 
There also will I worship thee as King. 
Yet still thy life is whole, and still I live 150 



The Passing of Arthur 157 

Who love thee ; but who hates thee, he that brought 
The heathen back among us, yonder stands, 
Modred unharm'd, the traitor of thine house.' ^ 

Then spake the King : ' My house hath been my 
doom. 
But call not thou this traitor of my house 155 

Who hath but dwelt beneath one roof with me. 
My house are rather they who sware my vows, 
Yea, even while they brake them, own'd me King. 
And well for thee, saying in my dark hour. 
When all the purport^ of my throne hath fail'd, 160 

That quick ^ or dead thou boldest me for King. 
King am I, whatsoever be their cry ; 
And one last act of knighthood shalt thou see 
Yet, ere I pass.' And uttering this the King 
Made at the man : then Modred smote his liege 165 

Hard on that helm which many a heathen sword 
Had beaten thin ; while Arthur at one blow, 
Striking the last stroke with Excalibur, 
Slew him, and all but slain himself, he fell. 

So all day long the noise of battle roll'd 170 

Among the mountains by the winter sea ; 
Until King Arthur's Table, man by man, 
Had fall'n in Lyonesse about their lord, 
King Arthur. Then, because his wound was deep. 
The bold Sir Bedivere uplifted him, 175 

1 Family. ^ Aim of my kingship. ^ Living. 



158 Idylls of the King 

And bore him to a chapel nigh the field, 

A broken chancel ^ with a broken cross, 

That stood on a dark strait ^ of barren land : 

On one side lay the Ocean, and on one 

Lay a great water,^ and the moon uas full. 180 

Then spake King Arthur to Sir Bedivere : 
* The sequel of to-day unsolders "^ all 
The goodliest fellowship of famous knights 
Whereof this world holds record. Such a sleep 
They sleep — the men I loved. I think that we 185 
Shall never more, at any future time. 
Delight our souls with talk of knightly deeds, 
Walking about the gardens and the halls 
Of Camelot, as in the days that were. 
I perish by this people which I made, — 190 

Tho' Merlin sware that I should come again 
To rule once more ; but, let what will be, be, 
I am so deeply smitten thro' the helm 
That without help I cannot last till morn. 
Thou therefore take my brand Excalibur, 195 

Which was my pride : for thou rememberest how 
In those old days, one summer noon, an arm 
Rose up from out the bosom of the lake. 
Clothed in white samite, mystic, wonderful. 
Holding the sword — and how I row'd across 200 

And took it, and have worn it, like a king ; 

1 Part of chapel which contains the altar. 

2 Narrow strip. ^ Lake. * Dissolves. 



The Passing of Arthur 159 

And, wheresoever I am sung or told 

In aftertime, this also shall be known : 

But now delay not : take Excalibur, 

And fling him far into the middle mere : 205 

Watch what thou seest, and lightly^ bring me word.' 

To him replied the bold Sir Bedivere : 
' It is not meet, Sir King, to leave thee thus, 
Aidless, alone, and smitten thro' the helm — 
A little thing may harm a wounded man ; 210 

Yet I thy hest - will all perform at full. 
Watch what I see, and lightly bring thee word.' 

So saying, from the ruin'd shrine he stept, 
And in the moon athwart the place of tombs. 
Where lay the mighty bones of ancient men, 215 

Old knights, and over them the sea-wind sang 
Shrill, chill, with flakes of foam. He, stepping down 
By zigzag paths, and juts of pointed lock, 
Came on the, shining levels of the lake. 

There drew he forth the brand Excalibur, 220 

And o'er him, drawing it, the winter moon. 
Brightening the skirts of a long cloud, ran forth 
And sparkled keen with frost against the hilt : 
For all the haft twinkled with diamond sparks. 
Myriads of topaz-lights, and jacinth-work 225 

Of subtlest jewellery. He gazed so long 

1 Quickly. 2 Command. 



i6o Idylls of the King 

That both his eyes were dazzled as he stood, 

This way and that dividing the swift mind, 

In act to throw : but at the last it seem'd 

Better to leave Excalibur conceal'd • 230 

There in Ibe many-knotted waterllags, 

That whistled stiff and dry about the marge. 

So strode he back slow to the wounded King. 

Then spake King Arthur to Sir Bedivere : 
' Hast thou perform'd my mission which I gave ? 235 
What is it thou hast seen ? or what hast heard ? ' 

And answer made the bold Sir Bedivere : 
' I heard the ripple washing in the reeds, 
And the wild water lapping on the crag.' 

To whom replied King Arthur, faint and pale : 240 
' Thou hast betray'd thy nature and thy name, 
Not rendering true answer, as beseem'd ^ 
Thy fealty,- nor like a noble knight : 
For surer sign had follow'd, either hand, 
Or voice, or else a motion of the mere. 245 

This is a shameful thing for men to lie. 
Yet nov\S I charge thee, quickly go again. 
As thou art lief ^ and dear, and do the thing 
I bade thee, watch, and lightly bring me word.' 

Then went Sir Bedivere the second time 250 

Across the ridge, and paced beside the mere, 

1 Befitted. 2 Loyalty. - Beloved. 



The Passing of Arthur i6i 

Counting the de^vy pebbles, fix'd in thought ; 

But when he saw the wonder of the hilt, 

How curiously and strangely chased,^ he smote 

His palms together, and he cried aloud : 255 

' And if indeed I cast the brand away, 
Surely a precious thing, one worthy note, 
Should thus be lost for ever from the earth. 
Which might have pleased the eyes of many men. 
What good should follow this, if this were done ? 260 
What harm, undone ? Deep harm to disobey, 
Seeing obedience is the bond of rule. 
Were it well to obey then, if a king demand 
An act unprofitable, against himself? 
The King is sick, and knows not what he does. 265 

What record, or what relic of my lord 
Should be to aftertime, but empty breath 
And rumours of a doubt ? But were this kept, 
Stored in some treasure-house of mighty kings. 
Some one might show it at a joust of arms, 270 

Saying, " King Arthur's sword, Excalibur, 
Wrought by the lonely maiden of the Lake. 
Nine years she wrought it, sitting in the deeps 
Upon the hidden bases of the hills." 
So might some old man speak in the aftertime 275 

To all the people, winning reverence. 
But now much honour and much fame were lost.' 

1 Engraved. 

IDYLLS OF THE KING — 1 1 



i62 Idylls of the King 

So spake he, clouded with his own conceit,^ 
And hid Excahbur the second time, 
And so strode back slow to the wounded King. 280 

Then spoke King Arthur, breathing heavily : 

* What is it thou hast seen ? or what hast heard ? ' 

And answer made the bold Sir Bedivere : 
' I heard the water lapping on the crag, 
And the long ripple washing in the reeds.' 285 

To w^hom replied King Arthur, much in wrath : 

* Ah, miserable and unkind, untrue, 
Unknightly, traitor-hearted ! Woe is me ! 
Authority forgets a dying king. 

Laid widow'd of the power in his eye 290 

That bow'd the will. I see thee what thou art. 

For thou, the latest-left of all my knights. 

In whom should meet the offices of all, 

Thou wouldst betray me for the precious hilt ; 

Either from lust of gold, or like a girl 295 

Valuing the giddy pleasure of the eyes. 

Yet, for a man may fail in duty twice, 

And the third time may prosper, get thee hence : 

But, if thou spare to fling Excalibur, 

I will arise and slay thee with my hands.' 300 

Then quickly rose Sir Bedivere, and ran, 
And, leaping down the ridges lightly, plunged 

1 Notion. 



The Passing of Arthur 163 

Among the bulrush beds, and clutch'd the sword, 

And strongly wheel'd ^ and threw it. The great brand 

Made lightnings in the splendour of the moon, 305 

And flashing round and round, and whirl'd in an arch,, 

Shot like a streamer of the northern morn,^ 

Seen where the moving isles ^ of winter shock 

By night, with noises of the Northern Sea. 

So flash 'd and fell the brand Excalibur : 310 

But ere he dipt* the surface, rose an arm 

Clothed in white samite, mystic, wonderful, 

And caught him by the hilt, and brandish 'd him 

Three times, and drew him under in the mere. 

And lightly went the other to the King. 315 

Then spoke King Arthur, drawing thicker breath : 
' Now see I by thine eyes that this is done. 
Speak out : what is it thou hast heard, or seen ? ' 

And answer made the bold Sir Bedivere : 
' Sir King, I closed mine eyelids, lest the gems 320 

Should blind my purpose, for I never saw. 
Nor shall see, here or elsewhere, till I die. 
Not tho' I live three lives of mortal men. 
So great a miracle as yonder hilt. 

Then with both hands I flung him, wheeling him ; 325 
But when I look'd again, behold an arm, 
Clothed in white samite, mystic, wonderful, 

1 Swung it round. ^ Aurora borealis. 

^ Icebergs. - Touched. 



164 Idylls of the King 

That caught him by the hilt, and brandish'd him 
Three times, and drew him under in the mere.' 

And answer made King Arthur, breathing hard : 330 
' My end draws nigh ; 'tis time that I were gone. 
Make broad thy shoulders to receive my weight. 
And bear me to the margin ; yet I fear 
My wound hath taken cold, and I shall die.' 

So saying, from the pavement he half rose, 335 

Slowly, with pain, reclining on his arm, 
And looking wistfully with wide blue eyes 
As in a picture. Him Sir Bedivere 
Remorsefully regarded thro' his tears. 
And would have spoken, but he found not words ; 340 
Then took with care, and kneeling on one knee, 
O'er both his shoulders drew the languid hands, 
And rising bore him thro' the place of tombs. 

But, as he walk'd, King Arthur panted hard. 
Like one that feels a nightmare on his bed 345 

When all the house is mute. So sigh'd the King, 
Muttering and murmuring at his ear, ' Quick, quick ! 
I fear it is too late, and I shall die.' 
But the other swiftly strode from ridge to ridge, 
Clothed with his breath,^ and looking, as he walk'd, 350 
Larger than human on the frozen hills. 
He heard the deep behind him, and a cry 

1 Surrounded by his frosty breath. 



The Passing of Arthur 165 

Before. His own thought drove him like a goa^.. 

Dry clash'd his harness in the icy caves 

And barren chasms, and all to left and right 355 

The bare black cliff clang'd round him, as he based ^ 

His feet on juts^ of slippery crag that rang 

Sharp-smitten with the (I'nt of armed heels — 

And on a sudden, lo ! the level lake, 

And the long glories of the winter moon. 360 

Then saw they how there hove " a dusky barge. 
Dark as a funeral scarf from stem to stern, 
Beneath them ; and descending they were ware ^ 
That all the decks w^ere dense ^ with stately forms, 
Black-stoled. black-hooded, like a dream — by these 365 
Three Queens with crowns of gold : and from them rose 
A cry that shiver'd to the tingling stars, 
And, as it were one voice, an agony 
Of lamentat'On, like a wind that shrills 
All night in a waste land, where no one comes, 370 

Or hath come, since the making of rhe world. 

Then murmur 'd Arthur, ' Place me in the barge.' 
So to the barge they came. There those three Queens 
Put forth their hands, and took the King, and wept. 
But she, that rose the tallest of them all 375 

And fairest, laid his head upon her lap. 
And loosed the shatter'd casque,^ and chafed his hands, 

1 Set. 2 Points, ^ Came in sight. * Aware. 

5 Crowded. ^ Helmet. 



1 66 Idylls of the King 

And call'd him by his name, complaininp; loud. 

And dropping bitter tears against a brow 

Striped v/iih dark blocd : for -a II his face was white 380 

And colourless anc^ like the wither'd moon 

Smote by the fresh beam of the springing east ; 

And all his greaves^ and cuisses- dash'd with drops 

Of onset ; ^ and the light and lustrous curls — 

That made his forehead like a rising sun 385 

High from the dais-throne^ — were parch 'd with dust; 

Or clotted into points and hanging loose, 

Mix'd with the knightly growth that fringed his lips. 

bo like a shatter 'd column lay the King ; 

Not like that Arthur who, with lance in rest, 390 

From spur to plume a star of tournament. 

Shot thro' the lists at Camelot, and charged 

Before the eyes of ladies and of kings. 

Then loudly cried the bold Sir Bedivere : 
' Ah ! my Lord Arthur, whither shall I go ? 395 

Where shall I hide my forehead and my eyes ? 
For now I see the true old times are dead, 
When every morning brought a noble chance,^ 
And every chance brought out a noble knight. 
Such times have been not since the light that led 400 
The holy Elders with the gift of myrrh. 
But now the whole Round Table is dissolved 

1 Armour for the lower part of the legs. 

2 Armour for the thighs. ^ Blood drawn in battle. 
* Throne set on a platform. ^ Opportunity. 



The Passing of Arthur 167 

Which was an image of the mighty world. 

And I, the last, go forth companionless, 

And the days darken round me, and the years, 405 

Among new men, strange faces, other minds.' 

And slowly answer'd Arthur from the barge : 
' The old order changeth, yielding place to new, 
And God fulfils himself in many ways. 
Lest one good custom should corrupt the world. 410 

Comfort thyself : what comfort is in me ? 
I have lived my life, and that w^hich I have done 
May He within himself make pure ! but thou. 
If thou shouldst never see my face again, 
Pray for my soul. More things are wrought by prayer 
Than this world dreams of. Wherefore, let thy voice 
Rise like a fountain for me night and day. 
For what are men better than sheep or goats 
That nourish a blind ^ life within the brain, 
If, knowing God, they lift not hands of prayer 420 

Both for themselves and those who call them friend ? 
For so the whole round earth is every way 
Bound by gold chains about the feet of God. 
But now farewell. I am going a long way 
With these thou seest — if indeed I go 425 

(For all my mind is clouded with a doubt) — 
To the island-valley of Avilion ; 
Where falls not hail, or rain, or any snow. 
Nor ever wind blows loudly ; but it lies 

1 Unconscious. 



1 68 Idylls of the King 

Deep-meadow 'd, happy, fair with orchard lawns 430 

And bowery hollows crown 'd with summer sea, 
Where I will heal me of my grievous wound.' 

So said he, and the barge with oar and s?-il 
Moved from the brink, like some full-breasted swan 
That, fluting a wild carol ere her death, 435 

Ruffles her pure cold plume,^ and takes the flood 
With swarthy webs.^ Long stood Sir Bedivere 
Revolving^ many memories, till the hull"* 
Look'd one black dot against the verge of dawn,^ 
And on the mere the wailing died away. 440 

But when that moan had past for ever jnore, 
The stillness of the dead world's winter dawn 
Amazed him, and he groan 'd, ' The King is gone.' 
And therewithal came on him the weird rhyme, 
' From the great deep to the great deep he goes.' 445 

Whereat he slowly turn'd and slowly clomb 
The last hard footstep of that iron crag; 
Thence mark'd the black hull moving yet, and cried, 
' He passes to be King among the dead, 
And after healing of his grievous wound 450 

He comes again ; but — if he come no more — 
O me, be yon dark Queens in yon black l^oat, 
Who shriek'd and wail'd, the ihree whereat we gazed 

1 Lifts her wings. ^ Black feet. ^ Turning over in mind. 
* Body of the barge. ^ The barge went eastward. 



The Passing of Arthur 169 

On that high day, when, clothed with hving light, 
They Lv^ood before his throne in silence, friends 455 

Of Arthur, who should help him at his need ? ' 

Then from the dawn it seem'd there came, but faint 
As from beyond the limit of the world. 
Like the last echo born of a great cry, 
SoriKls, as if some fair city were one voice 460 

Around a king returning from his wars. 

Thereat once more he moved about, and clomb 
Ev'n to the highest he could climb, and saw. 
Straining his eyes beneath an arch of hand, 
Or thought he saw, the sneck that bare the King, 465 
Down that long water opening on the deep 
Somewhere far off, pass on and on, and go 
From less to less and vanish into light. 
And the new sun rose bringing the new year. 



TO THE QUEEN 

[This second dedication of the Idylls to the Queen was printed 
in the Library Edition, 1 872-1 873. It is given here because it 
explains the meaning of the whole epic] 

O LOYAL to the royal in thyself, 
And loyal to the land, as this to thee — 
Bear witness, that rememberable day, 
When, pale as yet, and fever-worn, the Prince 
Who scarce had pluck'd his flickering life again 5 

From halfway down the shadow of the grave. 
Past with thee thro' thy people and their love. 
And London roll'd one tide of joy thro' all 
Her trebled millions, and loud leagues of man 
And welcome ! witness, too, the silent cry, 10 

The prayer of many a race and creed, and clime — 
Thunderless lightnings striking under sea 
From sunset and sunrise of all thy realm. 
And that true North, whereof we lately heard 
A strain to shame us ' keep you to yourselves ; 15 

So loyal is too costly ! friends — your love 
Is but a burthen: loose the bond, and go.' 
Is this the tone of empire ? here the faith 
That made us rulers ? this, indeed, her voice 
And meaning, whom the roar of Hougoumont 20 

170 



To the Queen 171 

Left mightiest of all peoples under heaven ? 

What shock has fool'd her since, that she should speak 

So feebly ? wealthier — wealthier — hour by hour ! 

The voice of Britain, or a sinking land, 

Some third-rate isle half-lost among her seas ? 25 

There rang her voice, when the full city peal'd 

Thee and thy Prince ! The loyal to their crown 

Are loyal to their own far sons, who love 

Our ocean-empire with her boundless homes 

For ever-broadening England, and her throne 30 

In our vast Orient, and one isle, one isle, 

That knows not her own greatness : if she knows 

And dreads it we are fall'n. — But thou, my Queen, 

Not for itself, but thro' thy living love 

For one to whom I made it o'er his grave 35 

Sacred, accept this old imperfect tale, 

New-old, and shadowing Sense at war with Soul 

Rather than that gray king, whose name, a ghost. 

Streams hke a cloud, man-shaped, from mountain peak, 

And cleaves to cairn and cromlech still ; or him 40 

Of Geoffrey's book, or him of Malleor's, one 

Touch 'd by the adulterous finger of a time 

That hover 'd between war and wantonness. 

And crownings and dethronements : take withal 

Thy poet's blessing, and his trust that Heaven 45 

Will blow the tempest in the distance back 

From thine and ours : for some are scared, who mark, 

Or wisely or unwisely, signs of storm, 

Waverings of every vane with every wind. 



172 Idylls of the King 

And wordy trucklings to the transient hour, 50 

And fierce or careless looseners of the faith, 

And Softness breeding scorn of simple life, 

Or Cowardice, the child of lust for gold, 

Or Labour, with a groan and not a voice, 

Or Art with poisonous honey stol'n from France, 55 

And that which knows, but careful for itself, 

And that which knows not, ruling that which knows 

To its own harm : the goal of this great world 

Lies beyond sight : yet — if our slowly-grown 

And crown'd Republic's crowning common-sense, 60 

That saved her many times, not fail — their fears 

Are morning shadows huger than the shapes 

That cast them, not those gloomier which forego 

The darkness of that battle in the West, 

Where all of high and holy dies away. 65 



NOTES 



GARETH AND LYNETTE 

I. Lot. King of Orkney; one of those who betrayed Arthur 
and fought against him in the barons' war (cf. The Coming of 
Arthur, 115). A crafty and cold-hearted man. 

I. Bellicent. Daughter of Gorlois and Ygerne (cf. 7"//,? C(?wz;?^ 
of Arthur, 189 ff. and 358 ff.), according to the old legends a 
reputed half-sister of Arthur (which would make Gawain, Modred, 
and Gareth his nephews) ; but Tennyson says no relation ( The 
Passing of Arthur, 155; Guiiievere, 570). 

21-25. Here is the key-note of the poem : the noble quality of 
Gareth's ambition. 

25. Gawain. Eldest brother of Gareth, surnamed " the Courte- 
ous," for his fine manners. He takes half after his father, half after 
his mother; being brave and polite, but not trustworthy. 

26. Modred. Second son of Lot and Bellicent : a mean traitor. 
He takes wholly after his father. 

40. Goose and golden eggs. An old nursery tale (cf. Tenny- 
son's poem, The Goose'). 

66. Excalibur. Arthur's sword, wrought by magic in the Lake, 
(cf. The Coming of Arthtir, 294); symbol of sacred authority. 

119. Alludes to the doubts in regard to Arthur's birth and right 
to the throne (cf. The Coming of Arthur, 140-236). 

133. Arthur's war with the Roman emperor ( The Coming of 
Arthur, 476, 503 ff.). 

135. Arthur's war with the Saxon invaders of Britain ( The Com- 
ing of Arthur, 35-120). 

185. Camelot. Arthur's capital, according to Tennyson, prob- 
^11 



1 74 Notes 



ably the site of Queen-Camel in Somerset; but some identify it 
with Winchester. 

186-193. This passage is intended to show the mystical and 
dreamlike nature of the story. 

1 99. To Northward. The Orkney Islands lie north of Scotland. 

209-226. The gateway is symbolical. The statue of the Lady 
of the Lake symbolizes Religion : her dress ripples away like water, 
to show that the forms of Religion are always changing : her arms, 
like the cross, support the cornice, to show that the substance of 
Religion is unchanging. The sword signifies Divine Justice; the 
censer, human worship ; the sacred fish is the ancient emblem of 
Christ, because the letters of the Greek word IX9T2 are the initials 
of 'Irjaovs Xpcarbs Qeov 'Ti6s Swr^p, "Jesus Christ, God's Son, 
Saviour." Arthur's wars are carved around her to show that the 
warfare of the ideal centres about Religion : new and old things 
are mingled because the ancient conflicts are always repeating them- 
selves in new forms, so that it confuses us to study them, unless we 
remember that the difference of time is nothing, the principles of 
the strife are always the same. The three queens are Faith, Hope, 
and Charity, the handmaids of Religion. This mystical Lady of 
the Lake takes no part in the action of the Idylls, but she appears 
in the background as a person of the greatest power. She gives 
Arthur his sword, Excalibur {i.e. the authority and power of the 
King are derived from Divine Justice ; The Coming of Arthur^ 
294 ff.). She is present at his coronation, clothed in white {i.e. the 
exaltation of the Soul above the Sense is sanctioned by Religion ; 
The Coming of Arthur, 284 ff.). She takes back the sword when 
he is dying, and the barge that carries him away to Avilion is sent 
by her {i.e. Religion presides over the resignation of mortal life 
and the hope of immortality). 

235. Ancient Man. Probably Merlin, the old magician, Arthur's 
protector and teacher. He represents human knowledge : philoso- 
phy, art, and science. 

249-274. Merlin's speech represents the doctrine of philosophy 



Gareth and Lynette 175 

that the senses deceive us and things are not what they seem. The 
fairy king and queens coming from the East are probably symbols 
of the old mythologies from which poetry and the arts were derived. 
The city built to music is civilization adorned and changed by the 
arts of the successive centuries. The dispute as to whether the 
King is a shadow and the city real, or vice versa, is the old conflict 
between the materialists and the idealists. Merlin holds with the 
idealists, that the reality is the King, i.e. the Soul. He says that it 
is a shame for a man not to be bound by Arthur's vows, because 
man's duty is to live by the law of the ideal; but at the same time 
no man can keep the vows, because the ideal is always above us. 
If a man refuses to accept the ideal as his law, he lives as an animal, 
among the cattle of the field. The progress of civilization is never 
completed and never ceases : as long as the music lasts the city 
is building. 

275. Gareth's plain, matter-of-fact character is shown by his 
speech. He thinks Merlin is mocking him with nonsense. 

283. Merlin's wisdom penetrates Gareth's disguise. 

293. This sentence is at fault in grammar, "let not she nor / be 
blamed." But Gareth's honest, loyal nature comes out again. 

305. Note the strong effect of the break in this line, coming 
after the first word. 

322. Note the purity of the court at this time. 

340. Arthur condemns so-called " rights of property " based on 
old deeds of injustice : one of Tennyson's modern touches. 

359. Sir Kay. The steward of Arthur's household, his major- 
domo ; a sharp-tempered, suspicious, rough-tongued old knight, 
but faithful. 

362. Gyve and gag. An allusion to the old punishment for a 
scolding woman, who was tied in a ducking-stool with a muzzle on 
her head. 

367. Aurelius Emrys. A descendant of the last Roman general 
who claimed the purple as Emperor in Britain ; he was poisoned, 
and Uther succeeded him. 



176 Notes 

376. Mark. The wicked, cowardly, old King of Cornwall, whose 
court is full of evil, as represented by Vivien {Merliii and Vivien, 
17 ff.), and by Tristram (^The Last Tournament, 748). 

422. Lap him up in cloth of lead. Sheet-lead was used to 
wrap around the dead. 

430. And evermore a knight, etc. The King would send him 
out to right the wrong and help the suppHant. 

451. Lancelot. The greatest of Arthur's knights, called Lance- 
lot of the Lake, because he was under protection of the Lady of the 
Lake {^Lancelot and Elaine, 1393). Arthur loves and trusts him 
( The Coming of Arthur, 1 24 ff.) ; sends him to bring Guinevere to the 
marriage ( The Coming of Ai'thur, 446 ff.). Lancelot yields to love for 
Guinevere and betrays Arthur ; but this comes after the present idyll. 

455. Hands. From his large, fair hands Gareth, in Malory's 
story, receives from Sir Kay the nickname of Beaumains. 

490. Caer-Eryri. Snowdon, the highest mountain of Britain. 

492. Avilion. The Earthly Paradise of the Britons. The name 
means " place of apples "; it was identified later with Glastonbury. 

536. It appears the King has known who Gareth was all the time. 

610. This Order. The first definite mention, in this idyll, of the 
Round Table. Malory connects this order of knights with a certain 
round table which Merlin made for Uther, signifying the round 
world (Z^ Morte Darthur, xvi. 2) ; this table was in possession of 
King Leodogran, who sent it with his daughter Guinevere, when 
she was married to Arthur, with the hundred good knights who sat 
around it. The full number of seats is one hundred and fifty ; and 
Arthur proceeds to fill up the number {Le Morte Darthur, ii. 1,2). 
All this previous history of the Round Table, Tennyson omits. He 
makes it an order founded by Arthur, to bring together the knights- 
errant of the realm and bind them by vows to obey King and con- 
science, to uphold Christianity, to redress human wrongs, to speak no 
slander but always the truth, and to be faithful in love {^Guinevere, 

457 ff-). 

614. That old knight-errantry. The independent and lawless 



Gareth and Lynette 177 



knights who roamed the country before Arthur founded the Round 
Table. 

618. That is, these knights make themselves into a little allegory, 
a masquerade, of human hfe, claiming to rule over Youth, Manhood, 
Old Age, and Death. 

671. Dull-coated things. Beetles (d. T/ie Foresters, " Beeiles' 
jewel armour " ; also T/ie Two Voices, lo, description of the 
dragon-fly). 

731. At times the wild vermin give off a disagreeable scent. 

796. Note how the sound of this line fits the sense. 

829. A roasted peacock was served at splendid feasts. The 
guests took a vow before it : the knights promising to be brave ; 
the ladies to be loving and faithful (Stanley's History of Birds, 281). 
This peacock was an unconscious rebuke to Lynette's discourtesy 
and harshness. 

871. In floods, animals of all kinds, driven by fear, take refuge 
together on the islands. 

970. Lynette now begins to change her mind about Gareth; but 
she is too proud still to confess outright her feelings, so she puts 
them into her song. 

1067. Harden'd skins. The evil habits of old age, which fit 
closely as the skin, and are hard to break. 

1 1 12. Lynette has now entirely changed her mind about Gareth ; 
and in her excitement lets it out. 

1 1 33. This is Lynette's confession of her fault, and praise of 
Gareth's nobility. 

1 156. The heron stands resting with one leg tucked up under 
him ; but before he can fly he must let it down in order to make a 
little jump into the air and launch himself on his wings. 

1 172. The letters of the inscription are like those found on a 
cliff beside the river Gelt, probably carved by a Roman soldier in 
the third century : VEXL. LEG. 11. AUG. 

1174. The old allegory in stone is deeper than the perversion 
of it by the four caitiff knights. Phosphorus is the morning-star; 

IDYLLS OF THE KING — 12 



1 78 Notes 

Meridies is the noon-day ; Hesperus is the evening-star. Night 
and Death are distinct figures. The soul takes refuge from the 
power of Time to waste and mar the hfe, in the hiding-place of 
Rehgion, the hermit's cave. 

1186. Lancelot's coat of arms: lions rampant, azure, and crowned, 
gold (but in The Lady of Shaiott, 78, 

"A red-cross knight forever kneel'd 
To a lady in his shield "). 

He rode with shield covered because the King had ordered him to 
follow Gareth secretly (cf. 571). 

1 187. Gareth was carrying the shield which he took from Sir 
Morning-Star. 

1 1 96. Lynette slips back again into petulance and pride; she 
still thinks, and probably will always think, too much of outward 
honour ; but her anger is not very deep, she is half-playful. 

1 281. The Celtic legends connected the name of Arthur with 
the signs of heaven and with the mountains (cf. The Last Tourna- 
ment, 332 ff.). Arthur's Ilufe, or haunt, was the name given 
among the Britons to Arcturus and the constellation Bootes. When 
the clouds are moving, the stars appear to move in the opposite 
direction. 

1288. Lynette is now so much in love with Gareth that she can- 
not bear to have him run into what she thinks a mortal peril. She 
would rather risk Lancelot. 

Note the humorous and playful element in this idyll. No one is 
killed outright : even the three robbers (793) are only " quieted," 
and Sir Evening- Star is thrown into the river, " sink or swim " (i 126). 



LANCELOT AND ELAINE 

1. Elaine. A Celtic form of Helen. Malory calls her " Elaine 
le Blank," the white Elaine. 

2. Astolat. Identified with Guildford, in Surrey. 



Lancelot and Elaine 179 

23. Caerleon. A place in Monmouthshire, on the river Usk. 
Malory makes it Arthur's capital. 

35. Lyonesse. A tract of land formerly stretching from Corn- 
wall to the Scilly Isles, but now covered by the sea. The country 
where Arthur was reared. 

72. Note in Lancelot's silence a possible reason why the Queen 
began to be suspicious and jealous. 

78. Guinevere. The daughter of Leodogran, King of Cameli- 
ard (Scotland? cf. The Coming of Arthur, 1-4) » whom Arthur 
loved at first sight (55-57, 76-93) and married (446-474). 

104. Cf. Balin and Balan, 235-270. 

169. This old, dumb servant is introduced into the story by 
Tennyson, in order that he may row the funeral barge at the close 
of the idyll, and not tell the courtiers who Elaine is. 

172. Malory says the name of the Lord of Astolat is Sir Bernard. 

185. This shows the seclusion in which the household of Astolat 
lived. 

210. Elaine's dream is a prophecy of what happens to the dia- 
mond at last (cf. 1228 ff.). 

220. Lavaine is of the same type as Gareth : simple, bold, faith- 
ful ; but not of such high blood or fine nature. 

251. Compare this with the description of the man who had a 
devil, St. Luke, viii. 29. 

279. Badon hilL The scene of Arthur's great battle, where he 
overthrew nine hundred and sixty of the invaders in one onslaught. 
It is commonly identified with a hill near Bath ; but some say it 
was near Linlithgow in Scotland. 

287. In this account of the twelve battles Tennyson follows the 
passage in the history of Nennius, which may be found in Bohn's 
Translation, Six Chronicles, p. 408. 

293. Our Lady's Head. This description of the image of the 
Virgin Mary's head is taken in part from Nennius, and in part from 
Spenser, The Faerie Queene, i. vii. 29, 30. 

297. The Wild White Horse. A white horse was the national 



i8o Notes 

emblem of the Saxons, It was kept in the temple of their war- 
god; and the legend says that when the Saxons were at war the 
god rode the white horse by night against their enemies. 

304. Their war-cry was " Christ and King Arthur." 

341. Note the effect of the shifted stress on hesitating, which 
seems to make the verse pause. 

356. Favour. A token given by a lady to her chosen knight, 
to wear in tournament or battle, as a sign that he fought for her. 

396. Here Tennyson finishes his explanation of how the shield 
came into Elaine's care, closing with the same words which he uses 
in line 27. Now he moves forward with the story. 

398. Note the length of this line, which has six accented syllables. 

406. This reflection of the green light from the grass, on the 
chalk-rock in the roof of the cave, is a remarkable bit of description. 

408. The aspen-tree is a poplar {popiihts tremula). Perhaps 
Tennyson means both the trembling poplar and the silver poplar 
{popuhis alba). 

411. This line is a "Homeric echo." The ancients conceived 
the sun as rising from an underworld. 

422. Pendragon. A title conferred on several British chiefs in 
times of danger, when they were given supreme power : from two 
Celtic words meaning head ruler. A legend says that when the 
title was first given to Uther, Arthur's father, a star appeared in the 
sky; shaped like a dragon; hence the crest. 

453. Held the lists. In a tournament, one party was supposed 
to defend the field against the other party, which tried to drive 
them out. Lancelot joins the attacking party. 

480. This splendid picture of a wave was noted down by Tenny- 
son on his voyage to Norway when crossing the German ocean. 

524. His party. The attacking party in the tournament, com- 
posed of knights outside the Round Table, men from distant 
regions. 

553. Note the description of Gawain in this passage, as a type 
of the outward form of chivalry at its best, without the inward spirit 



Lancelot and Elaine i8i 

of loyalty. Tennyson hints at an inherited taint in his blood, by 
mentioning Lot as his father (cf. note on Gareth and Lynette, i). 

575. Lancelot told me. In saying this the Queen spoke falsely. 
It was she who suggested this idea (cf. 147 ff.). 

602. Note how the unsuspecting King brings out the thought 
that Lancelot has fallen in love with some lady. This fills the 
Queen with a passion of jealousy ; and yet she herself is the one 
who by her suspicions has brought about the situation. 

653. Her. Originally this word was him. But this was not 
accurate, as the female falcon is the bird used in hawking, being 
larger and fiercer than the male. Tennyson's revision of the line 
illustrates his truthfulness in natural description, 

655. The lark flies upward into the blue sky until it becomes 
invisible. 

713. Here Arthur touches the lack in Gawain of the inward 
spirit of true chivalry : absolute fidelity to a promise ; perfect sur- 
render to a quest. 

796. Cf. Gareth and Lynette, 209 ff. 

841. There bode the night. This is a touch of modern pro- 
priety, making Elaine spend each night with her relatives in the 
city. In Malory's book, as in the French romances, she watches 
by Lancelot all the time (Z^ Morte Darthur, xviii. 15). 

842. Dim rich city. Note that Tennyson always gives a mysti- 
cal dreamlike atmosphere to Camelot. 

846. Here Tennyson seems to make an exception to the rule that 
Elaine must spend the night in Camelot, remembering perhaps 
that a man in fever needs a nurse's care at night most of all. 

871. Observe here the three pairs of conflicting words: honour 
— dishonour ; faith — unfaithful ; falsely — true. The strife arises 
from the war between Sense, which controls his passion for Guine- 
vere, and Soul, which rules his loyalty to Arthur. The victory 
now turns towards the lower side of his nature ; but there are hours 
of repentance, and the final result is still uncertain. 

924. The reader should notice in this passage the deUcacy with 



1 82 Notes 

which Tennyson has represented Elaine's love ; bold, because it is 
so innocent. It must be remembered that she knows nothing of 
Lancelot's relation to the Queen. She has also misinterpreted his 
courtesy and kindness as marks of his fondness for her. And she 
does not speak her love until his oft-repeated question practically 
forces her confession. 

966. Too courteous. This idea of a purposed discourtesy on 
the part of Lancelot, to cure Elaine of her hopeless love, is intro- 
duced by Tennyson into the story. 

1000. The metre of this song is five-stress iambic, three-line 
stanzas. The first two lines in each stanza are rhymed in couplet; 
the third line forms a burthen, repeated, and ending in stanzas i 
and 3, with " no, not I " ; in stanzas 2 and 4 with " let me die." 

1015. The Phantom of the house. An allusion to the Celtic 
legend of the Banshee, a female spectre who always appears and 
laments when a member of the family is about to die (cf. Croker, 
Fairy Legoids and Traditions of the South of Ireland ; Baring- 
Gould, Curious Myths of the Middle /iges, Series 2, pp. 215, 225). 

1029. Among the woods. Refers to 271 ff. 

1031. The great river. The Thames, which flows by London, 
where Arthur is now holding his court (cf. 76). Guildford is only 
thirty miles southwest of London ; and if the Castle of Astolat was 
in this region, it would be only a few miles from the Thames, in 
which the sea-tide ebbs and flows for about twenty miles above 
London Bridge. 

1079. In this passage the contrast between the trustfulness of 
Elaine and the suspicious jealousy of the Queen comes to light 
most clearly. 

1 168. The Queen is trembling with concealed passion, so that 
the lace on her bosom quivers, and the shadow vibrates on the wall. 

1 1 78. Tawnier than her cygnet's. The colour of the young 
swan is a yellowish dun. Lancelot says that the swan's neck is less 
white than Guinevere's, by as much as the cygnet's neck is less 
white than the swan's. 



Lancelot and Elaine 183 

1254. Half-face. As he sat at the oars the dumb man was in 
profile; as he rose to leave the boat he turned his full face to the 
palace. 

1256. Sir Percivale. The two knights most pure and holy of 
all the Round Table were Percivale and Galahad (cf. The Holy 
Grail, 293-308). They are therefore most fit to carry the lily maid 
into the Hall. 

1285. Lancelot now sees that the love of Elaine is the purest 
and the most unselfish that he has ever known. 

1319. That shrine. According to history, Westminster Abbey 
was not founded until 616, by a Saxon king. 

1327. This is a fine line, but it is distinctly modern in feeling, 
having reference to the Westminster Abbey of to-day. 

1334. Gold and blue, Lancelot's colours. 

1375. Unbound as yet. The King is the one person at the 
court who does not know anything of the relation between Lancelot 
and Guinevere. 

1390. Lancelot means that the growth of jealousy signifies the 
dying-out of love. 

1393. The Lady of the Lake. See the note on Lancelot, 
Gareth and Lynette, 451. The meaning of this, interpreted as a 
parable, is that Religion (the Lady of the Lake) encouraged and 
nurtured the spirit of Chivalry (Sir Lancelot). This is what makes 
Lancelot ashamed of his fall from virtue and duty. 

141 8. After Lancelot's parting with the Queen, in the convent 
of Almesbury, he " went and took his horse, and rode all that day 
and all that night in a forest, weeping. And at the last he was ware 
of an hermitage and a chapel stood betwixt two cliffs, and then 
he heard a little bell ring to mass, and thither he rode and alight, 
and tied his horse to the gate, and heard mass. And he that sang 
mass was the bishop of Canterbury. . . . And then he kneeled 
down on his knees, and prayed the bishop to shrive and assoil him. 
And then he besought the bishop that he might be his brother. 
Then the bishop said, I will gladly: and there he put an habit 



1 84 Notes 



upon Sir Launcelot, and there he served God day and night with 
prayers and fastings. . . . Thus they endured in great penance six 
year. . . . i^nd thus upon a night there came a vision to Sir 
Launcelot, and charged him, in remission of his sins, to haste him 
unto Ahnesbury, — And by then thou come there, thou shalt find 
queen Guenever dead. . . . And when Sir Launcelot was come to 
Almesbury, within the nunnery, queen Guenever died but half an 
hour before. . . . And when she was put in the earth, Sir Launcelot 
swooned, and lay long still. . . . Then Sir Launcelot never after 
eat but little meat, nor drank, till he was dead : for then he sickened 
more and more, and dried and dwined away. ... So at a season 
of the night they [the company of hermits] went all to their beds, for 
they all lay in one chamber. And so after midnight against day, — 
the bishop that was hermit, as he lay in his bed asleep, he fell upon 
a great laughter; and there with all the fellowship awoke, and came 
to the bishop and asked him what he ailed. Alas, said the bishop, 
why did ye awake me ? I was never in all my life so merry and so well 
at ease. Wherefore ? said Sir Bors. Truly, said the bishop, here was 
Sir Launcelot with me, with more angels than ever I saw men upon 
one day ; and I saw the angels heave Sir Launcelot unto heaven, and 
the gates of heaven opened against him. ... So when Sir Bors 
and his fellows came to his [Launcelot's] bed, they found him stark 
dead, and he lay as he had smiled, and the sweetest savour about 
him that ever they felt." Malory, Le Morte Darihur, xxi. 10, 1 1, 12. 



THE PASSING OF ARTHUR 

I. Sir Bedivere. Knighted by Arthur at his coronation (^The 
Coming of Arthur, 172 ff.) ; called by Geoffrey of Monmouth the 
King's cup-bearer ; mentioned in three books of Malory's Le Morte 
Darthur. 

6. March to westward. The King has come home from his 



The Passing of Arthur 185 

war with Lancelot in Brittany {Guinevere^ 430 ff,), and is now 
going westward to meet Modred at the head of his rebellious host. 

25. Reels back into the beast. This refers to the condition 
of savage disorder from which Arthur had rescued Britain by his 
strong and wise rule {The Coming of Arthur, 5-12). 

29. That last weird battle. Geoffrey of Monmouth calls it the 
battle of Camlan and says that it was fought in Cornwall, by the 
river Cambula. Tennyson adopts this view, rather than that of 
Malory, who places the battle at Salisbury (cf. 173, which says the 
battle was in or near Lyonesse). 

50. This speech of Bedivere, contrasting the passing away of 
fairies and enchantments with the permanence of Arthur's name 
and form, is one of Tennyson's modern additions. An ancient 
knight would have had no such ideas. 

69. Roman wall. A line of forts and a massive stone wall 
built across the island from the Solway to the Tyne, to repel the 
Picts and Scots. 

91. Note that Tennyson, carrying out the symbolism of the 
seasons, places this battle in the dead of winter, at the close of the 
year. Malory puts it in the spring : " on a Monday after Trinity 
Sunday" (Z<? Morte Darthur, xxi. 3). 

99. This is an image of the confusion in the moral warfare of the 
world, where good is often mistaken for evil, and where those who 
are on the same side hurt one another. This battle is the first form 
in which the war of Sense and Soul is represented in this idyll. 

144. I know not what I am. This strange feeling of unreality, 
a kind of waking trance in which everything becomes dreamlike 
and confused, was a state of mind to which Tennyson himself was 
subject. He represents it as a frequent experience of King Arthur 
(cf. The Holy Grail, 907 ff.). 

153. Modred. The old legend made Modred the unlawful son 
of Arthur, or his nephew, by Queen Bellicent (cf. Le Morte Darthur, 
i. 19; Geoffrey, Hist. Brit., 238). But Tennyson does away with 
all this, and makes him simply a wicked and traitorous knight. 



1 86 Notes 

170. This is the line with which Tennyson's first poem on the 
Morte d' Arthur begins. It is one of his best lines; note the long 
sound of the o's and a's. 

igi. This was the prophecy of Merlin ( The Coining of Arthur, 
418-423), and the legendary hope of the Britons (cf. Introduction, 
p. 17), said to be still alive among the peasants of Brittany. 

205. This is a sign of the resignation of the kingly authority to 
the Power who gave it. Some say that it signifies the passing away 
of the temporal authority of the church. 

2ig. Shining levels. The long, bright reflection of the moon 
in the water is seen best when one comes down to the shore. 

220. In the conflict of Bedivere's mind the idyll shows us, for 
the second time, the war of Sense with Soul. 

228. Dividing the swift mind. This is from Virgil, ^neid, 
iv. 285, ^^ Atque Animum mine hue eelerem, nune dividit illuc.^'' 

238. The ripple washing. Note the difference in sound be- 
tween the soft hissing of the ripples among the reeds, and the lap- 
ping of the water upon the rocks. 

272. Maiden of the Lake. In the Idylls, the Lady of the Lake 
is the allegorical figure of Religion (cf. The Coming of Arthur, 282- 
293; Gareth and Lynette^ 210-219; Lancelot and Elaine, 1393- 
1400). 

287. Compare this speech of Arthur with the version in Malory, 
xxi. 5 : " Ah traitor, untrue, said king Arthur, now hast thou betrayed 
me twice. Who would have wend that thou that hast been to me 
so lief and dear, and thou art named a noble knight, and would 
betray me for the riches of the sword. But now go again lightly, for 
thy long tarrying putteth me in great jeopardy of my life, for I have 
taken cold. And but if thou do now as I bid thee, if ever I may 
see thee, I shall slay thee with mine own hands, for thou wouldest 
for my rich sword see me dead." 

311. Rose an arm. This, of course, is the arm of the Lady of 
the Lake, who remains unseen in the depths. 

354. Dry clash'd. The adjective "dry" is not often used of 



The Passing of Arthur 187 

sounds. It describes a noise which is harsh and grating, made by 
something which is dry. 

366. Three Queens. Faith, Hope, and Charity (cf. note 209- 
226, Gareth and Lynette). 

375. The tallest. Charity. 

394. In the parting dialogue between Bedivere and Arthur the 
idyll shows us, for the third time, the war between Sense and Soul; 
or rather, between Doubt and Faith. 

401. The holy Elders. The Magi who were led by a star to 
Christ (^St. Matthew, ii. 2-1 1). 

415. Tennyson believed strongly in the power of prayer. He 
called it "the highest aspiration of the soul " (^Memoir, i. 324), and 
expressed his conviction, from experience, that God " can and does 
answer every earnest prayer " {Cojttemporary Review, March, 1893). 

420. Hands of prayer. The ancient attitude of prayer was 
standing, with hands stretched upwards. 

422. The figure of Nature's chain binding the world to the foot 
of the throne of the supreme deity is used by many writers (cf. 
Bacon, The Advancement of Learning, i ; and Milton, Paj'adise 
Lost^ ii. 105 1 ). But Tennyson, so far as I know, is the first to apply 
the figure to prayer. 

428. Where falls not hail, etc. This is like a passage from 
Lucretius, De Rertvn Natura, iii. 18-22 : "Their tranquil abodes 
which neither winds do shake, nor clouds drench with rains, nor 
snow congealed by sharp frost harms with heavy fall." (Munro's 
Translation.) 

435. Ere her death. It was an old notion that swans sang 
sweetly just before dying. Plato (in his Phcedo, 84) explains that 
" because they are sacred to Apollo, and have the gift of prophecy, 
and anticipate the good things of another world, therefore they sing 
and rejoice in that day more than they even did before." 

445. Repeated from The Coming of Arthur, 0^10. 

466. The mere is a salt-water lake which runs into the sea. 



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A History of English Literature 

By REUBEN POST HALLECK, M.A. (Yale) 
C/oth, 12mo, 499 pages. Illustrated . . Price $1.25 



Halleck's History of English Literature is a concise and 
interesting text-book of the history and development of Eng- 
lish literature from the earliest times to the present. While 
the work is sufficiently simple to be readily comprehended by 
high school students, the treatment is not only philosophic, 
but also stimulating and suggestive, and will naturally lead to 
original thinking. 

The book is a history of literature and not a mere collection 
of biographical sketches. Only enough of the facts of an 
author's life are given to make students interested in him as a 
personality, and to show how his environment affected his 
work. The author's productions, their relation to the age, and 
the reasons why they hold a position in literature, receive 
treatment commensurate with their importance. 

One of the most striking features of the work consists in 
the way in which literary movements are clearly outlined at 
the beginning of each of the chapters. Special attention is 
given to the essential qualities which differentiate one period 
from another, and to the animating spirit of each age. 

At the end of each chapter a carefully prepared list of 
books is given to direct the student in studying the original 
works of the authors treated. He is told not only what to 
read, but also where to find it at the least cost. 



Copies will be sent ^ prepaid, on receipt of the price. 

American Book Company 

NEW YORK * CINCINNATI ♦ CHICAGO 

(S. qq) 



Important Text=Books in Rhetoric 

BY ADAMS SHERMAN HILL 

Boylston Professor of Rhetoric and Oratory in Harvard University 



BEGINNINGS OF RHETORIC AND COM- 
POSITION $1.25 

This book is designed primarily to meet the needs of pupils 
in secondary schools who are learning to express themselves 
with the pen ; at the same time it contains so much infor- 
mation that is new in presentation and permanent in value 
that it is well adapted to more mature minds. It shows 
the young writer how to present what he has to say in the 
best English within his reach and in the form best adapted 
to his purpose. No supplement with exercises is required 
in connection with this work, as the book is complete in 
itself. Nearly two hundred exercises are introduced to aid 
the pupil in the most practical way. 

FOUNDATIONS OF RHETORIC . . $1.00 

The object of this book is to train boys and girls to say 
in written language, correctly, clearly, and effectively, what 
they have to say. It gives a minimum of space to tech- 
nicalities and a maximum of space to essentials. In language 
singularly direct and simple it sets forth fundamental prin- 
ciples of correct speaking, and accompanies each rule with 
abundant illustrations and examples. 

PRINCIPLES OF RHETORIC . . . $1.20 

This popular work has been almost wholly rewritten, and is 
enlarged by much new material. The treatment is based 
on the principle that the function of rhetoric is not to pro- 
vide the student of composition with materials for thought, 
nor yet to lead him to cultivate style for style's sake, but 
to stimulate and train his powers of expression — to enable 
him to say what he has to say in appropriate language. 



AMERICAN BOOK COMPANY 

(S. 87) 



ENGLISH COMPOSITION 



BUEHLER'S Practical Exercises in English 50 cents 

A DRILL-BOOK for grammar schools and high 
■^^ schools, containing a large number of exercises to 
be worked out by the student. He is made to 
choose between the correct and incorrect forms of 
expression, and to explain why he has done so. By 
this means he acquires the habit of avoiding mistakes 
rather than that of correcting them. 

BUTLER'S School English ... 75 cents 

/\ BRIEF, concise, and thoroughly practical manual. 
-^"^ The book is based on the following plan for 
teaching English: (1) The study and discussion 
of selections from standard English authors ; (2) 
constant practice in composition; (3) the study of 
rhetoric for the purpose of cultivating the pupil's 
power of criticising and improving his own writing. 

MAXWELL and SMITH'S Writing in English - 75 cents 

A BOOK for upper grammar classes and high schools, 
which aims to teach the correct writing of Eng- 
lish. It is based on the established principle of 
teaching from the whole to the parts. Entire compo- 
•Sitions are taken up first, followed by paragraphs, then 
sentence construction, and, finally, words. Models of 
good composition form a prominent feature, and give 
interest and value to the work. 



AMERICAN BOOK COMPANY 

[S.86] 



A Descriptive C^tdtlo^ue of HigK 
ScKool and College Text-Books 



\K7 E issue a complete descriptive catalogue 
of our text-books for secondary schools 
and higher institutions, illustrated with 
authors' portraits. For the convenience 
of teachers, separate sections are published, de- 
voted to the newest and best books in the following 
branches of study; 

EJVGLIS'H 

MJL THBMA TICS^ 

HISTO'Ry and 'POLITICAL SCIBJ^CB 

SCIBJVCK 

MOT>K^JV LAJVCl/AGKS' 

jXJVCIBJVT LAJSfGX/AGBS 

THILOS'O'PHJ^ and KT^X/CATIOJV 

If you are interested in any of these branches, 
we shall be very glad to send you on request the 
catalogue sections which you may wish to see. 
Address the nearest office of the Company. 

AMERICAN BOOK COMPANY 

TublUhers of School and College Tejci-'BooKs 
NEW YORK CINCINNATI CHICAGO 

Boston Atla^ntak. DaLlIaLS SaLr\ Fra.r\oisco 

(S. 312.) 



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